Saturday, 23 April 2011

Welcome to my world

Trigger warning, as I know some people reading this blog have been through this, and worse. I'm sorry to say that my first reaction was to think about the things the victim did wrong - leaving her spine exposed. Allowing her head to be hit so she went into temporary seizures, and so couldn't protect her vital organs by covering them with her arms and legs - items which, in extremis, are disposable. Things which can be severely damaged without killing you. As I had to do, a long, long time ago, in my childhood. And to give thanks that it wasn't a lot worse.

The video itself:

From the Facebook account of McDonald's employee Vernon Hackett, who filmed and laughed at the assault. And posted it online, to amuse his friends:

This happened after the President of the Maryland Senate said, on camera, that a bill granting the most limited human rights to Trans and Intersexed people was "Anti Family". And that as neither he, nor any other Maryland Senator or Representative would ever hire one, he couldn't ask his constituents not to discriminate too.

The bill was shelved. Parenthetically, Maryland has had equal rights for Gays and Lesbians since 2001.

This is the third beating of a Trans woman in a McDonald's store in the last few months, but it happens everywhere. The only thing unusual about this one was that it was recorded on video.

My main concern is for the psychological health of the victim. The physical damage appears not to be too bad, as long as there's no permanent damage to the brain. But the scars from something like this aren't all external. Trust me on that one. You don't forget, even 45 years later.

Thursday, 21 April 2011

Mercenaries in the Culture Wars

Assuming you're a bigwig in some Ideological group, with vast funds from a tiny handful of financiers, but very few people who actually support your position. How do you make it seem to politicians that you've got far more popular support - and hence influence at the ballot-box - than you actually do?

One way is to run an Astroturf campaign. From Wiki:


Here's the "Win Points to Earn Valuable Prizes" scale for the National Organisation of Marriage. Which, oddly enough, actively campaigns against marriage. But only those involving gays, lesbians, transsexual and intersexed people.

That's from a spreadsheet recently made public by Louis J. Marinelli. You see, he was anti-same-sex-marriage on moral grounds. But.. one problem with having people who work for you out of a sense of morality. If you're obviously morally bankrupt, they're likely to defect.
Cheapskates. From another article, about the financing:
I am sharing this with you because I want you to realize that NOM is a small group of devoutly religious Catholics supported by a couple of undisclosed sources. NOM is essentially made up of Brian Brown, its President, Maggie Gallagher, the CEO, a handful of other Board members (who are scattered across the country involved in other matters), a couple of advisors to Mr. Brown and a small and largely incompetent office staff.

Their social media management isn’t operated by NOM – they’re not big enough for that nor do they understand social media! As Jeremy Hooper detailed, Opus Fidelis manages NOM’s social media and websites.

From the Opus Fidelis website:
OPUSfidelis is an advisory services firm specialized in:

- Management Strategy (go-to-market and operations turn-around),

- Sales Acceleration (business development & sales coaching),

- New Media Strategy (Viral & Social media, and Cloud-based enterprise technologies).

Through its unique consulting approach, OPUSfidelis is delivering high value strategy advisory services to corporate customers, US Federal Contractors, Not for Profit (501c3-c4...), and political organizations & candidates.

OPUSfidelis is headquartered in Reston, Virginia, and works with local, national, and international organizations. Our portfolio of customers include Fortune 100 REIT (Real Instate Invesment Trust), US-based leading Real Estate Services provider (commercial, corporate, residential), political organizations including congressional and senatorial campaigns, US Federal contractors (technology and consulting), IT companies (software vendors, system integrators), international engineering firms, and Non for Profit organizations.
And... the "non denominational" "no contact with any religion" National Organisation for Marriage.

Also, it's "Estate" not "Instate". "Investment" not "Invesment".And "Not for Profit" not "Non for Profit".
We provide solutions for a dynamic environment where business and technology strategies converge. Our work team approach focuses on new ways of business combining best practices innovation and adoption while also leveraging an organization's current human talents and IT assets.

We are distinguished by the technical expertise of our staff and partners, our solid foundation in business strategy and operational improvements.

Business Performances are paramount to us and are the drivers to our customers’ relationship: we accelerate schedules with a high degree of time and cost predictability. OPUSfidelis helps industry leaders make crucial business decisions; increasing agility, slashing schedules. A chain reaction of success that dramatically improves efficiencies and positively impacts the achievements of an organization.
That's obscene. Not their secrecy or dishonesty, the Dilbertesque Full Buzzword Compliance, together with a lack of actual professional competence. Not even bothering to check the spelling of words on their website.

Wednesday, 20 April 2011

Thought For Today

It's the last frame that makes the difference, you see. Indomitable.

Monday, 18 April 2011

How Young is too Young?

One of the great dilemmas in treating children whose neurology is cross-sexed to some degree is that the pubertal clock is ticking. Children become pubescent before their brains have developed adequately for them to be judged competent to make decisions as an adult.

This leads to laws about "statutory rape" of adolescents, where although their reproductive systems may be physically developed, their intellect and ability to make informed decisions hasn't caught up. This is partly due to inexperience - innocence - but also due to incomplete neurological development.

From the Herald-Sun:
A Court has allowed a 10-year-old boy (girl-ZEB) to become the youngest Australian to have sex-change therapy.

The boy (girl-ZEB), known as Jamie, has lived as a girl for two years, dressing in feminine clothes, using the girls' toilet at school and "presenting as a very attractive young girl with long, blonde hair", the court heard.



The doctor said he was concerned about Jamie's rapid-onset puberty, which was equivalent to that of a 14-year-old, and that sex-change treatment should start immediately.
Sometimes Nature rushes us. 10 is too young to make a decision. But we have to guess what the right thing is to do here. Get it wrong one way, she may die, and will have entirely preventable problems her entire life. Get it wrong the other way, and we have interrupted the natural development of an effeminate gay boy, who may be just as happy living that way.

The best guess we have is to let puberty start, to let the child get a feel for it. If they react in utter horror, if symptoms of distress significantly worsen, then allow administration of puberty-delaying drugs. This is not a simple, clear-cut issue, many Gay and Lesbian advocacy groups think that we should let the brain develop naturally as puberty progresses, that we may be creating transsexuals out of gays. Not surgically, but by interrupting the natural neurological development process. They point out that mere gender non-conformant behaviour when young is usually a symptom of future homosexuality, not transsexuality. We can argue whether 20% or 35% of such children are transsexual[1], but there's no argument that 2/3 are gay or bisexual, not transsexual. It's complicated by the fact that many of those advocating a moratorium on treatment want all transsexuals to die on ideological grounds, and have said as much. One therefore might suspect their motives here,but what matters is not the motives, it's whether they're right or not.

The thing is, we don't allow treatment based purely on gender non-conformant behaviour of short duration, which is what pre-gay children exhibit. Or at least, we shouldn't. Given the general lack of knowledge in the medical profession in this particular area, it sadly wouldn't surprise me if a few incompetents did.

Here's the definitive paper on the subject:

Clinical management of gender identity disorder in adolescents: a protocol on psychological and paediatric endocrinology aspects-- Delemarre-van de Waal and Cohen-Kettenis 155 (Supplement 1): S131 -- European Journal of Endocrinology.
First, patients were considered eligible for a staged hormone treatment if they were (i) between 16 and 18 years, (ii) suffering from life-long gender dysphoria that had increased around puberty, (iii) functioning psychologically stable, and (iv) supported by their environment.

Since the experience of a full biological puberty may seriously interfere with healthy psychological functioning and well being, we have changed our protocol after the first follow-up studies on the 16–18-year olds (4, 5). Adolescents are now allowed to start puberty suppressing treatment with gonadotrophin-releasing hormone analogues (GnRHa) if they were older than 12 years of age and fulfil the same criteria as were used for the 16–18-year olds. They should also have reached Tanner stage 2 or 3 in combination with pubertal levels of sex hormones. The suppression of puberty using GnRHa is a reversible phase of treatment. This treatment is a very helpful diagnostic aid, as it allows the psychologist and the patient to discuss problems that possibly underlie the cross-gender identity or clarify potential gender confusion under less time pressure. It can be considered as ‘buying time’ to allow for an open exploration of the SR wish.

It is conceivable that lowering the age limit increases the incidence of ‘false positives’. However, it most certainly results in high percentages of individuals who more easily pass into the opposite gender role than when treatment commenced well after the development of secondary characteristics. This implies an improvement in the quality of life in these individuals, but may also result in a lower incidence of transsexuals with postoperative regrets or poor postoperative functioning. Clinically, it is known that some patients who were treated in adulthood regret SR because they have never been able to function inconspicuously in the opposite gender role. This holds especially for MFs, because beard growth and voice breaking give so many of them a never disappearing masculine appearance. But, since the number of ‘false positives’ should be kept as small as possible, the diagnostic procedure should be carried out with great care. Until now, no patients who started treatment before 18 years have regretted their choice for SR.
Jamie, the girl in Australia, would not have qualified. She would have had to wait another two years - and as her pubertal development was already that of a 14 year old, the consequences would have been grave. As in, quite possibly fatal, and leading to lifelong misery.

Had such treatment been available in the 1960's, I would not have qualified either. I showed little or no gender-nonconformant behaviour at the time. I was polite, biddable, shy, emotional, but I wanted to play with trucks and spaceships, not dolls. I was also extremely determined, quite happy to die in the attempt if it meant I succeeded, or that was the only chance of success. I didn't "know" I was female at age 3 or 4. It was only through a process of deduction that I realised it, and not before age 7. The process was complete by age 10. The re-think and re-evaluation when I learnt a bit more about biology a few years later never shook that knowledge. I never managed to convince myself completely that I was male, and goodness knows, I tried.

We're talking about extreme cases here. The so-called "Primary Transsexuals", far more strongly neurologically sexed than most humans. They literally cannot function as the opposite sex, the complete opposite of the many who are bi-gendered, who can.

From the UK Telegraph:
Nicki was born a boy but as early as 18-months-old, she was already trying on her mother's dresses and underwear.

At nursery, she shunned boys' games and preferred to play with the girls.

By four, Nicki was telling her mother Sharon, an IT manager, that "God made a mistake by making me a boy".

Two years later, she was already asking for a sex change operation.
See the difference? You can recognise these cases a mile away. They're nothing like me, I survived till age 47 without treatment. They can't make it past 25. Many don't make it to 20.
"She got quite a lot of stick because she was going to school as a boy and saying she was a girl.

"So, at eight, we made the decision not to let her do that.

"I let her grow her hair and she got a blouse and a skirt. She didn't have to wear boys' clothes at all anymore.

"As soon as I did that she was so much happier and the other kids understood it because she looked like a girl now."

But matters took a turn for the worse when Nicki moved on to secondary school, where she became suicidal because of bullying.

"She took four overdoses," said Sharon, from Yorkshire.

"For a year and a half she was spat at, kicked, punched, pushed over.

"One day, when she was walking home from school a group of boys surrounded her and tried to pull her skirt down."

"When she first got to the school, one boy announced 'So where is the tranny?' It was awful."

With the abuse expected to get worse as Nicki got closer to puberty, her mother began to look into the possibility of her daughter being prescribed hormone blockers.

She went back to the Tavistock clinic but was told they were unable to prescribe the treatment because it was against their guidelines to do any interventions before 16.

Fearing that her daughter may take her own life if forced to go through puberty, she went to an American expert Dr Norman Spack in Boston.

To her relief, Dr Spack, who runs a Gender Identity Disorder clinic in Boston, agreed to prescribe the 13-year-old Nicki the blockers.

Now 17, she has had a sex change operation and works as a care assistant.

"She holds down a full time and has been with her boyfriend for 18 months and she is gorgeous," said Sharon.

"I am absolutely positive she would not be here without the treatment."
I've seen one of Norman Spack's patients. Breathtakingly lovely, an elphin beauty, a girl who has had little psychological damage from her unusual biology. Some though. We can only reduce the harm, not prevent it, not without changing society. We can start though by legalising the best kind of medical treatment that we know of. Again, from the UK telegraph :
Until this month, British doctors were prevented from offering youngsters diagnosed with gender issues any medical intervention before the late stages of puberty usually at 16.

But now the National Research Ethics Service has given approval to the UK's only specialist clinic for GID – the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust in London – to prescribe the drugs to youngsters from 12 years old.

Dr Polly Carmichael, the clinic director, said the reduction in the age limit will be welcomed by families who would have otherwise had to travel abroad to the US for the treatment.

"The majority of our referrals are 15-plus and we get fewer from a younger age group," she said.


"I know what's been very hard for their families is knowing that there's something available but it's not available here.

[1] Psychosexual outcome of gender-dysphoric children.Wallien MS, Cohen-Kettenis PT. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2008 Dec;47(12):1413-23.

Friday, 15 April 2011

Science! Molecular Octopi!

One from Science Daily. I need some cheering up after all the struggle vs stupidity, ignorance and malice.

First, The 'molecular octopus': A little brother of 'Schroedinger’s cat'
For the first time, the quantum behaviour of molecules consisting of more than 400 atoms was demonstrated by quantum physicists based at the University of Vienna in collaboration with chemists from Basel and Delaware. The international and interdisciplinary team of scientists has set a new record in the verification of the quantum properties of nanoparticles.

In quantum physics, the propagation of massive particles is described by means of matter waves. In a certain sense, this means that the particles loose their classical property of a well-defined position and their quantum wave function can extend simultaneously over a large area. Formally, this state resembles that of a cat that is at the same time dead and alive. In quantum physics this is called a 'superposition'.
The use of specifically synthesized organic molecules consisting of complexes of up to 430 atoms enabled the researchers to demonstrate the quantum wave nature in mass and size regimes that hitherto had been experimentally inaccessible. These particles are comparable in size, mass and complexity to Insulin molecules and exhibit many features of classical objects. Nevertheless, in the current experiment the tailor-made molecules can exist in a superposition of clearly distinguishable positions and therefore -- similar to 'Schroedinger's cat' -- in a state that is excluded in classical physics.
So it's both there and somewhere else at the same time. Now it's OK for subatomic particles to do this, even individual atoms, bose-einstein condensates where bosons all occupy the same place, but now we're demonstrating it in molecules big enough to comprehend.

Thursday, 14 April 2011

How did this happen?

The Veronnica Baxter Inquest
"I have been going to Coronial Inquests for over 20 years and never have I attended an Inquest with so many anomalies."

From the SMH :




A Parliamentary inquiry may get rid of some of the coronial whitewash. And whitewash it was, the Coroner didn't enquire why or how Ms Baxter was given this 'special treatment' by persons unknown, nor what threats she may have been reacting to when she called for help. There is a real fear that the "suicide" may have been "assisted".

I fear the trail may be cold, but we're not giving up on this one.

Wednesday, 13 April 2011

Days of Future Past


Tuesday, 12 April 2011

A Minority View of Transsexuality


Quotes from the article (emphasis in the original)
























Dr Az Hakeem: Deconstructing Gender and Parallel Processes:
Features specific to a Specialist Transgender Psychotherapy Service

Dr Hakeem's recent works:





UPDATE: From Dr Hakeem's website


Friday, 8 April 2011

Another piece of the puzzle

We're starting to get a good handle on the degree of cross-sexing in the human brain in cases of Transsexuality. We know it's not complete - the anecdotal behavioural anomalies of Transsexed people, greater creativity, increased intelligence, the kinds of profession many enter - have been noted for many years. But such accumulations of anecdotes don't match the standards of proof we'd like. Better is actual measurements of the brain.

From Sex Dimorphism of the Brain in Male-to-Female Transsexuals. Savic I, Arver S. Cereb Cortex. 2011 Apr 5:
"Both male groups"... oops. That assumes something not actually true, and that there's plenty of evidence against. That MtoF Trans people are "really men". No matter, the data's what's important.
Like HeM, MtF-TR displayed larger GM volumes than HeW in the cerebellum and lingual gyrus and smaller GM and WM volumes in the precentral gyrus. Both male groups had smaller hippocampal volumes than HeW. As in HeM, but not HeW, the right cerebral hemisphere and thalamus volume was in MtF-TR lager (sic) than the left. None of these measures differed between HeM and MtF-TR.
In summary, we can't tell someone's sex just by looking at volumes of brain structures.

We knew that before, as I'll discuss later. But what about other variables? Age for example? Were there post-menopausal women in the control group? While the experimental subjects were all gynephillic - lesbian - the sexual orientation of the control groups weren't mentioned in the abstract (all we have at the moment), and neither was experimental group's HRT status - were they pre-op, post-op, on hormones? We know that latter's an important issue when it comes to gross volumes of brain structures from other experiments. We know the sexual orientation has correlations with characteristic brain activities too, though not brain volumes as far as I know.


If the Trans women had had little long-term Hormonal treatment, nor surgical intervention with hormonal balance consequences, little would be learned. If, on the other hand, HRT was underway, we'd need to look at the ages of those involved. If all were old, we could tentatively hypothesise that the effects on brain volume of sex hormones decreases over time.

We know that MtoF and FtoM are not simple mirror-images either: from Dichotic Listening, Handedness, Brain Organization and Transsexuality Govier et al International Journal of Transgenderism, 12:144–154, 2010

Moving right along: from Regional gray matter variation in male-to-female transsexualism. by Luders et al Neuroimage. 2009 Jul 15;46(4):904-7.
So it's not as simple as "girl brain in boy body", though that captures the essence of it. In certain ways, Trans people match neither a male nor female stereotype, nor anywhere in between.

Back to the 2011 paper "Sex Dimorphism of the Brain in Male-to-Female Transsexuals":
OK, that narrows things down a bit.
I'd say more than that: I'd say that a simplistic "boy brain" vs "girl brain" hypothesis had been disproved. The brain volumes are different, and hormones make a huge difference anyway. I think we had enough evidence of that already to treat it as a working hypothesis, just as we do that the brains of Trans people are cross-sexed in more subtle ways.

There's something more useful though.
Bingo. The Body Map. One more variable - were these Trans women all desirous of having sex reassignment? My working hypothesis is that some are not simply because that part of the brain is not affected by the generalised cross-sexing, visible not in brain volumes so much as cell type and grey matter distribution in certain brain structures, but not others. We should only say "boy brain in girl body" etc when telling "lies to children" on the very bottom rungs of Wittgenstein's ladder. There it's the best approximation to the truth, but not higher up.

TLDR version: Brain volumes alone aren't reliable for determining sex: you have to look at the deeper structure, the pattern of activity, and distribution of cell types.

I'll look forward to seeing the full paper: the abstract doesn't tell us enough. I'd also be interested in further work, with both androphillic male and gynephillic female controls, and of different age groups. We may just be detecting sexual orientation, nothing else.

My thanks to OII researcher M.Italiano for bringing this paper to my attention.

Wednesday, 6 April 2011

Thank You, Ms Stanton

From a report about proposed bills protecting TS and IS people in Nevada:
Following the SB 331 hearing, Chairman Schneider opened the hearing on SB 368, which would prohibit housing discrimination against transgender people. Equality Nevada Executive Director Lauren Scott, and vocal advocate for civil rights, related a story of housing discrimination she faced when she first relocated to Nevada from Florida. Senator James Settlemeyer (R-Minden) questioned the accuracy of Ms. Scott’s testimony, but she was not afforded an opportunity to respond as the Chair called an end to the meeting due to the lateness of the hour, telling both Sen. Settlemeyer and Ms. Scott that their disagreement could be handled off the record.
Because of course, there's no discrimination against Trans people in Nevada. None. Doesn't happen. I mean, the Senators would have noticed it, wouldn't they?
As the committee room emptied, Darlene Stanton, an unpaid lobbyist representing her own interests, but also involved with the Lyon County Republican Women, told Ms. Scott, who is a decorated veteran of the US Air Force, that she was a “disgrace to America.” Ms. Stanton also remarked that as a homeowner, she could “discriminate against whomever [she] wanted,” and that “people like [Ms. Scott] should leave the county” because it is “God’s country.” Ms. Stanton also said Ms. Scott was a pervert. The accost lasted not more than 10 seconds and was broken up when Elisa Cafferata of NAPPA stopped Ms. Stanton as she was approaching Ms. Scott, who remained seated and calm during the whole encounter. The incident was witnessed by many of the senators on the committee.

After, Ms. Scott said that such an encounter was to be expected, and that if it had to happen, it was good that it happened in front of the committee.
Fortuitous timing, but inevitable that it would happen. The strength of the bigotry is so strong, they can't keep their mouths shut, and physical assault is always a possibility. I don't think the "no discrimination happens in Nevada" meme is going to be very convincing after that. No rhetoric on the part of human rights activists could compare in credibility with the actions of the redoubtable Ms Stanton. We owe her thanks for her honesty.

Lyon County Republican Women
Club Mailing Address: P. O. 619, Yerington, NV 89447
President: Darlene Stanton
430 Pearl St., Yerington 89447

Tuesday, 5 April 2011

The Shape of the Earth






Monday, 4 April 2011

Dai Ichi Situation Reporting

The best source of data and analysis I've seen is the Physics Forum thread on Japan Earthquake: nuclear plants. This has commentary from radiologists, nuclear engineers, former nuclear power plant operators, physicists, and in general, a lot of people who know their stuff. It's confined to the physics of the situation.

A more politically-oriented thread on the same forum is the aptly named The "more political thread" besides "Japan Earthquake: nuclear plants" scientific one

Now some of the hard data regarding the power plants. First, the general environmental radiation close to the reactors, and a few hundred metres away. Note that Your Radiation May Vary, with hot-spots considerably in excess of these figures just metres away.

Now a bit of a worry: the aftershocks continue, so in addition to there being a generally high level of atmospheric and "skyshine" radiation from scattered gamma rays, plus the "hot" water that's at 100 Rem/Hour in places, plus the internal environment adjacent to the reactors which may be more like 2,500 Rem/Hr (down from 10,000)... the buildings are F*cked, to put it bluntly.

The toughest components were designed to take 440 gals - that is, sideways accelerations of up to 440 cm/sec/sec. They took 500.

Then got hit by a tsunami that inundated the buildings up to about 3m, from the looks of it. The traditional overturned semi-trailers, displaced cars etc.

Then took 3 separate explosions, one of which was considerably more violent than the other two, and partly directed sideways. The whole plant, all the buildings, are a mess, airtight they're not. Watertight they're not either, there's cracks everywhere, foundations, pipe channels, electrical conduit ducts, and the "hot" water will get everywhere eventually. Time is not on our side here, the contamination is getting worse and worse just as the reactors themselves are in dynamic equilibrium, being adequately cooled by water injection rather than circulation.

But it's worse than that, because aftershocks are still hitting the region, major earthquakes in their own right. If the buildings were structurally sound, no great drama, they could take that easily. But they're damaged, sometimes severely. Band-aid patches to stop water flow aren't supposed to take such treatment, even if they do work initially.

Note that in the following diagram, the severity uses the Japanese measure. Add about 12% to get the equivalent Richter magnitude.

Source: Graphing Earthquake, Radiation and Water Data in Japan

A technical challenge... and getting just a bit more difficult with every hour that passes, just as the environmental radiation some distance from the plant is becoming less hazardous. The most complete and accurate readings of the general area come from the extensive radiation monitoring equipment at the nearby Dai-Ni Nuclear Plant.

Compare and contrast to the Dai-Ichi figures.

And just to make your day... pressure in #1 Pressure vessel is rising (good that it's not leaking - the others are at ambient pressure), and so is radiation in the drywell surrounding it. Now close to 5,000 Rem/hr, and 650 kPa pressure, 250 over the usual (4 atmospheres - 400 kPa). Oopsie.

Source : based on #Fukushima reactor temp, pressure, water level+rate, CAMS radiation to #NISA / #METI release 72 (apr/04 08:00).

More Details on individual reactor status at Japan Atomic Industrial Forum Information on Status of Nuclear Power Plants in Fukushima

This is going to need a decade-long cleanup.

Saturday, 2 April 2011

Fukushima Dai ichi Contamination Distribution Map

Click to enlarge

Source : Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission

This shows accumulated dose in the immediate area without protection. It also shows the two area stretching to 40 km away with significant contamination, and that some areas 15km away are not affected as much.

This dose came from the short-lived radioactive nucleotides released in the first few days. Unfortunately, they also show where the dangerous Iodine-134, and the long-term problem Cesium-134 is as well.

So no green leafy vegetables grown inside the 5 boundary should be harvested for at least 30 years or so. Most should be relatively safe-ish (if checked) within 18 months. Just not grass, cabbage etc.

But then... the salt-contaminated soils in the whole of the tsunami region will be affected anyway, with all sorts of chemicals and heavy metals disturbed from their safe deposition by the tsunami. Plus the benzenes from the wrecked oil refineries etc. There will be birth defects and cancers from these far in excess of those caused by radiation, unfortunately, and not just confined to a small stretch of coast, but all the towns and cities along hundreds of kilometres of coastline.

The scale of the total received dose as of one week ago, I found shocking. Not so much the 10Sv (100% fatal dose) at the reactor site, but the extent of the 1/2 Sv (50 Rem) area. Although actual dose might be at most 1/2 and often 1/10 of this, they didn't evacuate any too soon: and the evacuation radius should be extended to 40km.

Friday, 1 April 2011

A History Of The Warfare Of Science With Theology

That's the name of a book written by Andrew Dickson White, in 1896.

A History Of The Warfare Of Science With Theology

We've descended into superstition since then, quite literally. When people were closer to the soil, they could see Reality more clearly - the curvature of the Earth visible on the plains, the existence of livestock with Intersex conditions, and the efficacy of lightning rods vs prayers and ringing bells vs the Thunderbolts of Heaven.

We live in a world of sufficiently advanced technology, to many people. I refer to Arthur C. Clarke's quote:
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Magic"
The scientifically uneducated live in a world filled with magic buttons that turn on lights, magic machines that allow them to watch films, magic, magic everywhere. So why not believe that it's captive demons inside the computer, that ghosts are real, and that the Earth is Flat because their Pastor tells them so.

It's not just the uneducated either: it's the morally and ideologically bankrupt, those who believe in the Triumph of the Will, that there is no such thing as objective fact, only useful and not-useful beliefs. Those who look upon the rest of humanity as legitimate prey, sociopaths.

We affirm that creatures who have only a spiritual dimension exist, that some serve God faithfully (angels) and others are in active rebellion against God (demons), and that the latter may possess unregenerate persons and oppress or influence regenerate persons. We deny that the Christian counselor may neglect the reality of demons, and that personal problems, organic or non-organic, are never the result of the influence of or possession by demons....

We affirm that all personal problems have their roots in the sin of Adam and Eve; that non-organic (and even many organic) problems are immediately affected by personal selfishness and rebellion against God and His Law, and that man's restraint against worse sin is due primarily to God's common grace and secondarily to the governing structures of conscience, family, state, and society. We deny that these problems may be explained entirely on any other basis; that men are basically "good" (moral); and that any man has within his own knowledge and energy all that he needs to solve his problems.
That's all from The Christian World View of Psychology and Counseling, which I've blogged about before.

They're evil: so they assume that everyone else is too. So to keep them in line, it's necessary to have an Invisible Sky Policeman who chastises the Ungodly with Natural Disasters.

From Martinsville Media
Though he later apologized, Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara said Monday that the calamity that hit his country was “tenbatsu,” or divine punishment, for the wickedness of the Japanese people. In some right-wing religious circles, leaders have called the disaster a prophecy about the need for more Japanese to turn to God.

U.S. Christian televangelist Pat Robertson said the 2009 earthquake which rocked Haiti and claimed more than 200,000 lives was because the country was “cursed” after making a “pact to the devil.” In 2005, after Hurricane Katrina slammed New Orleans, Texas mega-church pastor John Hagee said the storm, which left 1,400 dead, was the “judgment of God” for the sins that took place on its streets.
And for some of course, it's all about the money. From World Net Daily:
Tim LaHaye, the best-selling author of the "Left Behind" series of Bible prophecy novels, was one of many visiting the island of Maui who had to be evacuated to upper floors of the Marriott Hotel today.


"The Bible tells us in Matthew 24 that one of the signs of the last days – one of the birth pangs to occur – is an increase in earthquake activity and intensity," LaHaye told WND. "We're seeing that happen here. It's not just earthquakes, but hurricanes and all kinds of natural disasters."
LaHaye, an evangelical pastor, has written more than 60 non-fiction books on a wide range of subjects such as family life, temperaments, sexual adjustment, Bible prophecy, the will of God, Jesus Christ, and secular humanism with over 14 million in print, some of which have been translated into as many as 32 foreign languages.

The books of his "Left Behind" fiction series, co-authored with Jerry B. Jenkins, have broken all publishing records with a total of 80 million in print. Based on the Bible, the apocalyptic thrillers follow the lives of those left behind after the sudden disappearance of millions of believers.
I'll leave with some quotes from Robert A Heinlein:


I contend that the disgusting behavior of many of their alleged 'holy men' relieves us of any intellectual obligation to take the stuff seriously. No amount of sanctimonious rationalization can make such behavior anything but pathological.
In many ways, we're a lot more ruled by superstition than in 1896. Part of that is because Science has shown itself to be perfectly corruptible. The invention of Poison Gas in World War I, the Industrial Death Camps in Nazi Germany..
"If we fail, the whole world will sink into the abyss of a new dark age made more sinister and perhaps more prolonged by the lights of a perverted science." — Winston Churchill, June 18, 1940
Yes, we won. But Science was shown to be a very human endeavour - as it is - and thus fallible. Many turn their back on evidence and rationality in search of infallible truth as the result, with horrific consequences.