Showing posts with label antifa. Show all posts
Showing posts with label antifa. Show all posts

Wednesday, 22 September 2021

What I've Been Reading, July and August 2021

Links

Above the Fold

Miscellaneous

Structural Violence

Black Lives Matter, Race, Racism

Coronavirus

Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

The New Fascism, the Far-Right and Antifa

I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

Collapse

Responding to Collapse,

Climate Change, or rather, actually, Global Warming

Recipes and Cooking

  • The Secret to Making your Good Soup Glorious, by Malky McEwan, Medium
    "A top chef let me in on this trick and science agreed with him"
    This is essentially the same trick my wife taught me. Or if you end up frying the soup ingredients in a frying pan, be sure to deglaze the pan and put the resulting liquid into the soup. There is a lot of flavour there you don't want to miss out on.

Genetic Engineering

Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

  • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
    "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
    A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
  • A 16th-century Dutchman can tell us everything we need to know about GMO patents, by Nathanael Johnson, Grist
    "Today's agribusiness patent holders have locked out innovation. The annals of maritime exploration offer a way out. Really! "

Practical Skills

Writing Skills

American Politics

  • Biden’s Invisible Ideology, by Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker
    "The President has deployed an exasperating but effective strategy to counter Trumpism."

Canadian Politics

Linguistics

Dancing on Graves

Debunking Resources

These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

Science

Lacking an Owner's Manual

The human body/mind/spirit doesn't come with an owner's manual, and we continually struggle to figure out how best to operate them.

  • The Sexiest Things You Can Ever Do for Her, by Jessica Wildfire, Medium
    "Guaranteed to blow her mind, anytime."
  • The system of mathematics I wish I had known long ago, by Theodorrism, Medium
    "Go on. Learn. Do this for yourself."

    • Gender and Sexuality

    Poverty, Homeless People, Minimum Wage, UBI, Health Care, Affordable Housing

    Education

    Humour

    These are great times for political satire.

    Books

    Fiction

    Non-Fiction

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    Saturday, 24 July 2021

    What I've Been Reading, June 2021

    Links

    Above the Fold

    • Our Civilization is Dying Because It’s Addicted to Fossil Fuels, by Umair Haque, Medium—Eudaimonia
      "Why We Need to Treat Clean Energy as Our Moonshot, Or Everything Collapses"
      Umair is right that our civilization is dying because it's addicted to fossil fuels. But he's wrong about finding a clean alternative. Even if we could, it would create as many problems as it solved.
    • No, We Can’t Just Leave Assholes Alone Anymore, by Jessica Wildfire, Medium
      “Left unchallenged, assholes took over America—along with most of the world. Now this class of assholes dominates our politics. They steer our economies. They run our media. They dole out promotions to other assholes, and punish anyone for trying to do the right thing. They tell us what to do and how to think. Now they’re even trying to tell us how to vote, and how to love.”
    • The Myth — and Liability — of America’s Obsession with Rugged Individualism, by Scott Galloway, Medium—Marker
      “The Ayn Rand image of the solo entrepreneur — Hank Rearden toiling alone in his laboratory to invent a new kind of steel — is a pernicious deception.”
      Many of my fellow Canadians will feel smug that we suffer much less from toxic individualism than the USA, but being better than the USA is a pretty minor achievement.
    • If You Think Socialism’s Unaffordable, You Don’t Understand Capitalism, by UmairHaque, Medium-Eudaimonia
      “How Hidden Hyperinflation Left Americans Broke, and What to do About It”
    • We Can’t Afford for Everyone to Have Their Own Opinion Anymore, by Jessica Wildfire, Medium
      “It’s getting us killed.”
    • Why the American Right is Having a Meltdown About Race, by Umair Haque, Medium—Eudaimonia
      “How White Rage Happens, And Why It Still Defines American Life”
    • Lies and honest mistakes, by Richard V Reeves, Aeon—Psyche
      "Our crisis of public knowledge is an ethical crisis. Rewarding ‘truthfulness’ above ‘truth’ is a step towards a solution"
      "Working against this constitution are the forces of what Rauch labels ‘troll epistemology’. Trolls seek not the truth, but the destruction of an enemy, ideological or personal. Trolls not only fail to display the virtues of sincerity and accuracy, they work in precisely the opposite direction, deliberately offering up distorted visions of reality, based on cherry picked information."

    Miscellaneous

    Coronavirus

    Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

    The New Fascism, the Far-Right and Antifa

    I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

    Resource Depletion, formerly (and still including) Peak Oil

    The change in title stems from the fact that it's not just oil that is peaking.

    Climate Change, or rather, actually, Global Warming

    • This is Why We Should Stop Calling it Climate Change, by Umair Haque, Medium—Eudaimonia
      “The Words 'Climate Change' May End Up Being The Biggest Lie Ever Told”
    • This Is What the Earth’s Climate Will Look Like in 2050, by Julia Slingo, Medium—One Zerp
      “The future under climate change can seem frighteningly vague and variable. A top climatologist explains what to expect in 2050.”
    • Debunking 25 arguments against climate change in 5 sentences or less (each), by Fallacy Man, The Logic of Science
      "Climate change is arguably one of the most misunderstood and controversial topics among the general public. Misinformation abounds, and many people are left debating whether or not we are causing it, and even whether or not it is happening at all. Among scientists, however, there is no serious debate, and there hasn’t been for many years. The evidence for climate change is extremely solid, despite what many blogs and politicians will tell you. Therefore, I want to try to correct some of that misinformation. Yesterday, I posted an extremely lengthy article debunking 25 myths and bad arguments about climate change. Today, I am posting the same information, but in a much more condensed form. I have attempted to address each argument in under 5 sentences. Obviously I had to leave out a lot of information, so if you want the more detailed explanations, please see the original post (each short response is accompanied by a link for the full-length explanation)."

    Gardening

    Genetic Engineering

    Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

    • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
      "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
      A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
    • Soil proprietor: Do GMOs promote dirt conservation? by Nathanael Johnson, Grist
      " Genetically engineered crops are supposed to make it easier for farmers to protect the earth by plowing less. But the record is spotty."

    Practical Skills

    • How to Free Up Space in Gmail, by Boone Ashworth and Lorne Goode, Wired
      “Google offers 15 GB of free storage with every account, but many users are hitting the limit. Use these tips to clear some room, and tidy your inbox while you're at it.”
      I've had a gmail account since shortly after gmail cameout, but I only recently switched to using gmail for all my email. Lots to learn.

    American Politics

    Dancing on Graves

    Debunking Resources

    These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

    Gender and Sexuality

    There is No God, and Thou Shall Have No Other Gods

    I don't think I've made any secret of the fact that I am an atheist, but I may not have made it clear that I think any sort of worship is a bad thing and that believing in things is to be avoided whenever possible. Indeed, I do not believe in belief itself. That's what the "Thou shall have no other gods" is about—it's not enough to quit believing in whatever God or Gods you were raised to believe in, but also we must avoid other gods, including material wealth, power and fame.

    Further, many people today (including most atheists) follow the religion of "progress", which is based on the belief that mankind is destined to follow a road that leads from the caves ever upward to the stars, and that however bad things seem today, they are bound to be better tomorrow due to technological advancement and economic growth. This is very convenient for those who benefit most from economic growth, but it is hardly based on any sort of science and leads to a great deal of confused thinking.

    Poverty, Homeless People, Minimum Wage, UBI, Health Care, Affordable Housing

    • The Rent’s Too Damned High, by Cory Doctorow, Medium—Gen
      “A human right, commodified and rendered zero-sum.”
    • Here’s Why You’re Broke, According to Wealthy Americans Who Skim My Articles, by Jessica Wildfire, Medium
      “The view from the top is judgmental.”
      “These people are straight up bullies, and what they need more than anything is a hard punch in their pocket books. They need to be reminded that all their 'hard won success' was supported by an infrastructure that no longer exists for the vast majority of Americans.”

    Humour

    These are great times for political satire.

    Books

    Fiction

    Non-Fiction

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    Wednesday, 17 March 2021

    What I've Been Reading, February 2021

    Links

    Above the Fold

    Usually I reserve this section for late breaking news. But this month I discovered a whole bunch of YouTube videos featuring David Gaeber, a notable anarchist scholar who passed away this past September. This isn't all of the videos I found, or even the best of them, it's just what I found time to watch.

    • Extinction and rebellion: the late David Graeber, by Peter Batt, YouTube
      "David argues that the political elite is 'useless', and could be easily dislodged by a rebellion with even vague aims."
    • David Graeber - The Bully's Pulpit: On the Elementary Structure of Domination, by David Graeber, YouTube—AudibleAnarchist
      "In this essay, Graeber links the psychological impulses of bullying—both of bullies and of passive observers of bullying—to structures of power inherent within hierarchical authority. He contends that from a young age, we are socialized to side with bullies and against victims, and we are socialized to see victims as either deserving their punishment or of having the same moral worth as the bullies themselves."
    • Where Did Money REALLY Come From? by David Graeber, YouTube—Deficit Owls
      "Professor David Graeber, anthropologist and author of 'Debt: The First 5,000 Years,' discussing the history of money and credit. The economics profession tends to teach that money arose from barter. However, anthropologists have been searching for 200 years and found absolutely no evidence for this. "
    • Graeber and Wengrow on the Myth of the Stupid Savage, by David Graeber and David Wengrow, YouTube
    • Graeber and Wengrow on the Myth of the Stupid Savage, by David Graeber, Jourtnal du Mauss
      "What if the kind of people we like to imagine so simple and innocent because they are free from rulers, governments, bureaucracies and ruling classes, were free not because they lack imagination, but because they are in fact more imaginative than us. We find it hard to imagine what a truly free society would look like; perhaps they do not have as much difficulty imagining what would be an arbitrary power and domination. Maybe they can not only imagine it, but also consciously organize their society in such a way that such things never happen."

    Miscellaneous

    The Lights Went Out in Texas

    Structural Violence

    • Women Aren't Nags—We're Just Fed Up, by GEMMA HARTLEY, Harpers Bazaar
      "Emotional labor is the unpaid job men still don't understand."
      I found this on Facebook, read it, shared it and thought, yep, that's an example of structural violence against women. I was amazed that the men who commented were mainly apologists for the guy in the article. A guy who clearly didn't want to do his share of the relationship building work in his marriage.
    • Structural Violence, Wikipedia
    • Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology, by David Graeber,
      In this book, David Graeber introduced me to this idea of structural violence in relationships between the oppressed and their oppressors. The following quote is to be found on pages 72 and 73 of the book:

    "Such a theoretical emphasis opens the way to a theory of the relation of power not with knowledge, but with ignorance and stupidity. Because violence, particularly structural violence, where all the power is on one side, creates ignorance. If you have the power to hit people over the head whenever you want, you don’t have to trouble yourself too much figuring out what they think is going on, and therefore, generally speaking, you don’t. Hence the sure-fire way to simplify social arrangements, to ignore the incredibly complex play of perspectives, passions, insights, desires, and mutual understandings that human life is really made of, is to make a rule and threaten to attack anyone who breaks it. This is why violence has always been the favored recourse of the stupid: it is the one form of stupidity to which it is almost impossible to come up with an intelligent response. It is also of course the basis of the state.

    Contrary to popular belief, bureaucracies do not create stupidity. They are ways of managing situations that are already inherently stupid because they are, ultimately, based on the arbitrariness of force.

    Ultimately this should lead to a theory of the relation of violence and the imagination. Why is it that the folks on the bottom (the victims of structural violence) are always imagining what it must be like for the folks on top (the beneficiaries of structural violence), but it almost never occurs to the folks on top to wonder what it might be like to be on the bottom? Human beings being the sympathetic creatures that they are this tends to become one of the main bastions of any system of inequality—the downtrodden actually care about their oppressors, at least, far more than their oppressors care about them—but this seems itself to be an effect of structural violence. "

    Somewhere else (I haven't been about to find the quote), Graeber explains that a certain amount work is involved in any relationship that doesn't involve oppression, as those involved strive to understand each other. If you hear someone on one side of a relationship talking about how it is impossible to understand the other, it is a sure sign that they are "on top" and don't have to do the work because they can simply tell those on the other side to shut up and do what they are told. Those who are "on the bottom" develop, as a defense mechanism, a highly refined understanding on those who are above them. You see this between men and women, bosses and workers, masters and slaves, and so on.

    Coronavirus

    • We Hate You Now—The Hardest Problem of The Aftertimes, by Quinn Norton, Medium—Surviving COVID-19
    • The Differences Between the Vaccines Matter, by Hilda Bastian, The Atlantic
      "Yes, all of the COVID-19 vaccines are very good. No, they’re not all the same."
      "'The idea that people can’t handle nuance,' Jha tweeted at the end of February, 'it’s paternalistic. And untrue.' I couldn’t agree more. The principle of treating people like adults is fundamental. We don’t need to exaggerate. Talking about the trade-offs between different medicines and vaccines is often complicated, but we do it all the time—and we can do it with COVID-19 vaccines too."

    Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

    The New Fascism, the Far-Right and Antifa

    I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

    Collapse

    • Overconsumption, Wikipedia
      "Overconsumption is a situation where resource use has outpaced the sustainable capacity of the ecosystem. A prolonged pattern of overconsumption leads to environmental degradation and the eventual loss of resource bases."
    • Human Overpopulation, Wikipedia
      "Human overpopulation (or particularly human population overshoot) refers to a human population being too large in a way that their society or environment cannot readily sustain them. It can be identified with regional human populations, but is generally discussed as an issue of world population. Overpopulation is caused by human population growth. In recent centuries, human population growth has become exponential, due to the green revolution and other changes in technology that reduce mortality. Experts concerned by overpopulation argue that overpopulation causes overconsumption and subsequently overshoot of natural resources. This leads to exceeding the carrying capacity of a geographical area (or Earth as a whole) and damages to the environment. Human overpopulation is often discussed as part of other population concerns such as demographic push, depopulation, or even ecological or societal collapse and human extinction."

    Genetic Engineering

    Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

    • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
      "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
      A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
    • Golden apple or forbidden fruit? Following the money on GMOs, by Nathanael Johnson, Grist

    Dancing on Graves

    • Rush Limbaugh Made America Worse, by Alex Shephard, The New Republic
      "The racist, sexist radio host played a pivotal role in injecting cruelty and conspiracy into conservative mass media."
      "He thrived on making people angrier and more alienated, on obscuring the truth, and rewarding meanness at every turn."

    Debunking Resources

    These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

    Science

    Lacking an Owner's Manual

    The human body"/mind/spirit doesn't come with an owner's manual, and we continually struggle to figure out how best to operate them.

  • Is the Western way of raising kids weird? by Kelly Oake, BBC—Weird West | Parenting
    From sleeping in separate beds to their children to transporting them in prams, Western parents have some unusual ideas about how to raise them.
    The key to thinking outside the Western box might be to remember that babies are not out to manipulate us, no matter how tempting it might be to see it that way at 3am. "What we really need with babies is to stop thinking about them as hard-to-please bosses," says Dutta. "They're helpless little beings that have come into this world, and we must look at them with empathy and compassion."
  • 15 Mini Things That Can Instantly Make You Less Likable, by John Roe, medium—Mind Cafe

    • Refugees and Migration

    Poverty, Homeless People, Minimum Wage, UBI, Health Care, Affordable Housing

    Education

    Humour

    Books

    Fiction

    I finally finished the Emberverse series this month, a total of 15 novels.

    Non-Fiction

    Still reading A People's History of the United States. Still highly recommended.

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    Monday, 23 November 2020

    What I've Been Reading, October 2020

    Links

    Above the Fold

    • Howard Zinn: Don’t Despair about the Supreme Court, by Howard Zinn, The Progressive
      "It would be naive to depend on the Supreme Court to defend the rights of poor people, women, people of color, dissenters of all kinds. Those rights only come alive when citizens organize, protest, demonstrate, strike, boycott, rebel, and violate the law in order to uphold justice."
    • The Tragedy of the ‘Tragedy of the Commons’, by Matto Mildenberger, Pocket— Scientific American
      "The man who wrote one of environmentalism’s most-cited essays was a racist, eugenicist, nativist and Islamaphobe—plus his argument was wrong."
    • A response to Pollin and Chomsky: We need a Green New Deal without growth, by Jason Hickel, on Jason's blog
      Good stuff, but one needs to be aware of EROEI and the surplus energy problem to really have an intelligent discussion of Green New Deals. And to be aware that as we speak the planet's carrying capacity is decreasing, and so the sustainability target we are aiming for is continually moving.
    • Not a Coup but a Cover-Up and a Con Game, by Jeet Heer, The Nation
      "Trump is refusing to concede and purging the civilian leadership of the Pentagon. The moment requires vigilance rather than panic."
    • 'Sustainability is wishful thinking': get ready for the energy downshift, by John McCrone, Stuff—Environment
      "Renewables can’t deliver in this way so energy abundance is about to become energy poverty. And we need to get ready."
      "Focus on eliminating the need for energy rather than on worrying how to keep increasing its supply."
    • San Francisco just banned gas in all new buildings. Could it ever happen in Australia?, by Susan M Park and Madeline Taylor, The Conversation
      Perhaps all those who are eagerly awaiting their gas hook ups here in Kincardine should ask if this could every happen in Ontario.
    • Degrowth: A response to Branko Milanovic, by Jason Hickel, on his blog
      This is a must read, even if it is ridiculously optimistic about the likelihood of such policies ever being implemented. It is important to know what we are going to say no too, as we rush on toward collapse. And do follow the links, which lead to a bunch of good articles.

    Miscellaneous

    Things end up in this section not because they aren't important, but because I can't figure out what other section they should go in.

    Suddenly, "liberal" is a dirty word

    And with good reason, it seems.

    • David Graeber on the Extreme 'Centre', by David Graeber, YouTube—Double Down News
      “It strikes me that what’s called the moderates are the most immoderate people possible”
      "Previously unreleased video of David Graeber talking about liberalism. Originally filmed at the start of 2020. We planned to make a dedicated film on the subject with David upon his return to London. We release this video with the blessing of his beloved wife Nika.
      Rest in Power David Graeber"

    Coronavirus

    Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

    • The radical aristocrat who put kindness on a scientific footing, by Lydia Syson, Aeon—Psyche
    • Economics for the people—the challenge of reclaiming the commons from capitalism, by Dirk Philipsen, Aeon
      "Against the capitalist creeds of scarcity and self-interest, a plan for humanity’s shared flourishing is finally coming into view"
      We should be concerned about the "tragedy of the private", not the "tragedy of the commons".
      While this article recognizes the role of fossil fuels in driving growth of the private, it also makes a statement like, "We produce and grow enough for every child, woman and man to have a good and dignified life wherever they live". True, but we must consider the cost to the planet of producing and growing that much, and ask ourselves how long it can be sustained. (Not long, in case anyone is wondering.)
      Scarcity is real, capitalism only makes it worse, even as we produce more and more while ignoring the consequences
      Ordinary people these days have tastes borrowed from billionaires (comfort, convenience, entertainment) and no idea of frugality, so when you say "we produce enough", and talk about prosperity for all, it is taken as something entirely different from what this article means.
    • Are You An Anarchist?, by David Graeber, YouTube
    • David Graeber on basic income, by David Graber, YouTube
      "David Graeber speaking at 'Basic Income: How do we get there?' Basic Income UK meet-up at St Clements Church Kings Square, London, 3 December 2015."
    • David Graeber on a Fair Future Economy, by David Graeber, YouTube
      David Graeber was an anthropologist, a leading figure in the Occupy movement, and one of our most original and influential public thinkers.
    • The Future Is Worker-Owned, by Douglas Rushkoff, Medium—Team Human
      "It’s time for businesses to work for people, not the other way around."

    The New Fascism, and Antifa

    I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

    Resource Depletion, formerly (and still including) Peak Oil

    The change in title stems from the fact that it's not just oil that is peaking.

    • The fall of an empire, by Felix Salmon, Axios
      "The decline of ExxonMobil has been remarkable in its magnitude and unexpectedness."
    • Shell To Shut Down Louisiana Refinery, by Irina Slav, OilPrice.com
      "Royal Dutch Shell will shut down its Convent refinery in Louisiana after failing to find a buyer for the facility, Bloomberg reports, citing a statement by the company."

    Climate Change

    • Russian Arctic Sea Fails to Freeze , The Moscow Times
      "Russia’s Arctic Laptev Sea has not yet frozen for the first time since records began, according to the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Centre."

    Gardening

    Genetic Engineering

    Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

    • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
      "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
      A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
    • Food for bots: Distinguishing the novel from the knee-jerk in the GMO debate, by Nathanael Johnson, GRist— Panic-free GMOs

    Practical Skills

    • Make a mid-century modern-style coffee table, by Patrick Laperrière and Matt Wallace, YouTube— Lee Valley
      "Lee Valley’s Patrick Laperrière and Matt Wallace show you how to make a mid-century modern-style coffee table out of black walnut."
      I watched this video because I am at the moment seriously considering making a coffee table. It presents some good ideas.
    • Using a Blanket Pin, by Coalcracker Bushcraft, YouTube

    Canadian Politics

    Politics

    Linguistics

    Debunking Resources

    These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

    Science

    Lacking an Owner's Manual

    The human body/mind/spirit doesn't come with an owner's manual, and we continually struggle to figure out how best to operate them.

    Gender and Sexuality

    There is No God, and Thou Shall Have No Other Gods

    I don't think I've made any secret of the fact that I am an atheist, but I may not have made it clear that I think any sort of worship is a bad thing and that believing in things is to be avoided whenever possible. Indeed, I do not believe in belief itself. That's what the "Thou shall have no other gods" is about—it's not enough to quit believing in whatever God or Gods you were raised to believe in, but also we must avoid other gods, including material wealth, power and fame.

    Further, many people today (including most atheists) follow the religion of "progress", which is based on the belief that mankind is destined to follow a road that leads from the caves ever upward to the stars, and that however bad things seem today, they are bound to be better tomorrow due to technological advancement and economic growth. This is very convenient for those who benefit most from economic growth, but it is hardly based on any sort of science and leads to a great deal of confused thinking.

    Humour

    These are great times for political satire.

    Books

    Fiction

     

    Non-Fiction

    • Natural: How Faith in Nature's Goodness Leads to Harmful Fads, Unjust Laws, and Flawed Science, by Alan Levinovitz
      Overall, this book does a pretty good job of highlighting much of the nonsense done in the name of nature. If anything, he is a little too kind to the "natural" nuts, especially in the section on medicine. Personally, I just haven't found the medical profession to be as uncaring and inhuman as Leviowitz would have us believe. But then I don't live in the U.S.
      Anyway, if the idea that everything natural isn't necessarily good is new to you, this one is definitely worth a read.
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    Wednesday, 23 September 2020

    What I've Been Reading, August 2020

    Links

    Above the Fold

    Miscellaneous

    Suddenly, "liberal" is a dirty word

    And with good reason, it seems.

    Black Lives Matter

    Coronavirus

    Capitalism, Communism, Anarchy

    The New Fascism, and Antifa

    I hear a lot of well educated people saying that the people some of us are calling fascists don't meet all the criteria for being "real" fascists. Others have even accused us of calling anyone we disagree with a fascist. I predict that a few decades (maybe just a few years) from now those same people will be saying they wish they hadn't been quite so fussy with their definitions, and had acted sooner to oppose these "new fascists", even if they weren't identical to the fascists of the twentieth century.

    • This Is How It Happens, by Colin Horgan, Medium History
      "A study of men in Hitler’s Germany shows how people allow tyranny to spread"
      "What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise,” the philologist told Mayer. The Nazi dictatorship was “diverting,” he said, in that it kept people “so busy with continuous changes and ‘crises’ and so fascinated…by the machinations of the ‘national enemies’ without and within, that we had no time to think about these dreadful things that were growing, little by little, all around us."
    • Fascism Has Arrived in America. Now What? by Danielle Moodie, Medium—Zora
      "Trump is an autocrat, and here’s why you should care"

    Collapse

    Genetic Engineering

    Before jumping to the erroneous conclusion that this section was paid for by Monsanto, stop for a moment and understand that organic agriculture/food is a multi-billion dollar per year industry that relies on fear to get people to buy its product. Millions of dollars are spent to convince you that non-organic food is dangerous. In fact both conventionally grown and organic foods are equally safe. Sadly neither method of agriculture is even remotely substainable.

    • Panic-free GMOs, A Grist Special Series by Nathanael Johnson
      "It’s easy to get information about genetically modified food. There are the dubious anti-GM horror stories that recirculate through social networks. On the other side, there’s the dismissive sighing, eye-rolling, and hand patting of pro-GM partisans. But if you just want a level-headed assessment of the evidence in plain English, that’s in pretty short supply. Fortunately, you’ve found the trove."
      A series of articles that does a pretty good job of presenting the facts about GMOs. I plan to include one article from this series here each month.
    • Is extremism in defense of GM food a vice? by Nathanael Johnson, Grist

    American Politics

    • Is Trump Planning a Coup d’État? by Sasha Abramsky,
      "Many observers—including Republicans—worry that he is. They’re organizing now to stop him."
      "Fried, a student of history who chooses his words carefully, has concluded that Trump and his team are 'certainly racist, contemptuous of ordinary democratic and constitutional norms, and they believe their cause, their interests, are really the interests of the nation and therefore anything that keeps them in power is in the national interest. Does that make you a fascist? It kind of looks that way, doesn’t it?'"

    Canadian Politics

    Linguistics

    • Real talk, by Vyvyan Evans, Aeon
      "For decades, the idea of a language instinct has dominated linguistics. It is simple, powerful and completely wrong."

    Debunking Resources

    These are of such importance that I've decide to leave them here on an ongoing basis.

    Science

    Lacking an Owner's Manual

    The human body/mind/spirit doesn't come with an owner's manual, and we continually struggle to figure out how best to operate them.

    Gender and Sexuality

    There is No God, and Thou Shall Have No Other Gods

    I don't think I've made any secret of the fact that I am an atheist, but I may not have made it clear that I think any sort of worship is a bad thing and that believing in things is to be avoided whenever possible. Indeed, I do not believe in belief itself. That's what the "Thou shall have no other gods" is about—it's not enough to quit believing in whatever God or Gods you were raised to believe in, but also we must avoid other gods, including material wealth, power and fame.

    Further, many people today (including most atheists) follow the religion of "progress", which is based on the belief that mankind is destined to follow a road that leads from the caves ever upward to the stars, and that however bad things seem today, they are bound to be better tomorrow due to technological advancement and economic growth. This is very convenient for those who benefit most from economic growth, but it is hardly based on any sort of science and leads to a great deal of confused thinking.

    Poverty, Homeless People, Minimum Wage, UBI, Health Care, Affordable Housing

    Humour

    These are great times for political satire.

    Books

    Fiction

    Non-Fiction

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