On leaving the sinking ship
…[A]sk not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country. John F. Kennedy, Inaugural address, 20 January 1961 So, now it can be told: having finally escaped the Kafka-esque embrace of the Department of Work and Pensions – they owe me nothing and I owe them nothing – we have…
On the science of economics
David Roth memorably described the job of neoliberal economists as finding “new ways to say ‘actually, your boss is right.’”Cory Doctorow If science has value, it lies in its independence from considerations of political power. Objective truth, insofar as we can determine it, requires no further validation. The biological theories of Trofim Lysenko are not…
On the real and the virtual
It’s coming from the feelthat this ain’t exactly real,or it’s real, but it ain’t exactly there.Leonard Cohen, “Democracy” A few weeks ago, we came home to a sad discovery: the corpse of a male goldcrest on our kitchen windowsill. They are tiny, beautifully-feathered birds, and we hadn’t even realised we had them living nearby. It…
On the death of a thousand cuts
For if once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begin upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his…
On the coronation of Charles III
Always remember that the crowd that applauds your coronation is the same crowd that will applaud your beheading. People like a show.Sir Terry Pratchett (R.I.P.) It is arguably a brave decision on the part of the Heir Apparent to take his given name, Charles, as his regnal name. Well, one of his given names: he…
On terrorism considered as one of the fine arts
For if once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begin upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his…
On patriotism
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.Doctor Samuel Johnson Let me begin by distinguishing firmly between love of one’s country, on the one hand, and love of one’s government on the other. Governments of all stripes routinely wish to conflate the two, for the obvious reason that a government’s life would be much easier…
On the self-limiting nature of stupidity
Texas farm blaze kills 18,000 cows in deadliest barn fire on record in the USHeadline in THe Guardian, 14/04/2023 It is not, of course, news that people do stupid things. People have been doing stupid things for as long as there have been people. I don’t have statistics for this, because no such statistics are…
On creeds
All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason It’s Easter week as I write this, and an apt time, perhaps, to talk about creeds. A creed is a…
Garbage in, garbage out
On two occasions I have been asked, “Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?” … I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.Charles Babbage, Passages from the Life of a Philosopher[ Once upon a time,…
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The sound of falling leaves 