Last night, June third, handsome Los Angelinos such as myself were in lockdown for Wuhan and under simultaneous curfew for rioting: Double-secret probation. And at 6:33pm we felt the kick of an earthquake some distance away.

For others, Wednesday was even worse.

Who can safely drive a stolen car with all that racket?

Andrew Yang wants an an unarmed force of responders for domestic disturbances, welfare checks, etc.

The responses to his tweet have not been positive.

For a guy whose main selling point as a presidential candidate was that he once ran a successful business, I've got to wonder how he plans to pay for this unarmed hug brigade.

Me this afternoon: "Steal the fucking car already, and give us some peace!"

When's the last time a car alarm alerted anyone to an actual car theft? Most of the time, it's someone leaning on a car, someone intentionally setting off all the alarms in a neighborhood, or the wind blowing.

Earthquakes, too. Northridge cued a lush, syncopated symphony in Brentwood.

Some people say this song was the most wistful evocation of the mood in Los Angeles during the '92 riots.

But it's not really true. Everybody, EVERYBODY, knew the lyrics to this one.

Cooking robots have come a long way in a relatively short amount of time. We’re not yet at the point where we’ve got robot arms dangling from the ceiling that do all the work for us, but there are a bunch of robots out there with reasonable cookie-making skills. However, we’ve mostly seen cooking robots that are programmed to follow a specific recipe, rather than cooking robots that are programmed to cook you exactly what you want. Sometimes these are the same thing, but often cooking is (I’m told) much more about adapting a recipe to your individual taste.

https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/artificial-intelligence/robot-learns-to-cook-your-perfect-omelette

This article ponders whether the belief in a rational world that obeys a set of laws, a tenet at the heart of Catholicism, gave birth to modern science.

The article glosses over a few things, like the Persian and Chinese astronomers and mathematicians making discoveries without any Catholic influence.

Still, it raises an interesting point about the intersection and interaction of culture, philosophy, religion, and science.

Oh noes! Teh ebil joos aer at it agian! Reee!

Cancerous Twitter thread, you have been warned:

https://twitter.com/SilasCarceras7/status/1268374077623894017

Cosh with fresh horror from Tienanmen: "27 Army."

(Hi Orion)

Unusual spelling, but that's only because whatever page I copied it from got it wrong first.

Truth is difficult in the internet age, people.

I once sent my City Council member a proposed bill that would allow anyone awakened at night by someone else's car alarm to take a crowbar, pick axe, or sledge hammer to the offending car until the alarm can no longer be heard.

I call them "moron alarms" because everyone -- except the people who have them -- knows that nobody will pay attention or help if your car actually gets broken into. They'll just say "Good. Now the damn nuisance will go away."

I think the idea is it makes people look over, and car thieves don't want to be observed

I think it's not like that:

> For, if Catholic thinkers of the
> Middle Ages had not had faith in
> God’s orderly universe, the
> scientific revolution might never
> have happened, and all of the
> wonders of modern civilization
> might have remained a distant
> dream.

I would say no, c'mon, get outta here.

Firstly, because starting a sentence with "for" and a comma is antiquarian and preachy, as if spoken from the firm plane of rationality which the piece seeks to claim as its conclusion. That's naughty. We (readers) aren't on his team yet.

Second, when he says "Catholic thinkers" he can only be describing a small minority of the faith's authorities. The rest would have been happy to claim the resources under discussion for other purposes, and most often did, for centuries.

Third, the Church was one of the few institutions with the resources to fund anything at all. I mean, it was one of the few institutions, period. So to say it invented education and bureaucracy and administration and all these other realms we now so deeply adore merely prepares us to ask: So what did they DO with those developments? For the first two thousand years, I mean. It wasn't astronomy.

Fourth, when money gets spent (especially by a bureaucracy), some of it always gets spent on wild shit. We see that even in recent times, the church has been investing in wild shit we do not admire, specifically the defense of wretched men who diddle children. The church literally offers no accounting of its books for or to the larger project of humanity.


Years ago, commenter Paul said "[E]ven as an atheist I have to respect religion as the crazy hippie mother of science, law and philosophy...." I've always admired that wording.

Doesn't mean I wanna go over to her place for dinner.

Paul said that here: Paul Hrissikopoulos at March 9, 2007 9:33 AM.

I would say no, c'mon, get outta here. ~ Crid at June 5, 2020 12:21 AM

I agree that the author gives the Catholic Church outsized credit here. I mean, there were countless Chinese, Persian, Indian, Mayan, and other mathematical and astronomical advances made without the influence of Mother Church.

More likely it was the culture that led the Church to a belief in a rational world and not the other way around. Religion, like politics, is a trailing indicator.

Nonetheless, I found the author's view of the interplay of cultural, religious, and philosophical influences on how people view the world around them to be interesting, if a bit biased.

We see that even in recent times, the church has been investing in wild shit we do not admire, specifically the defense of wretched men who diddle children. ~ Crid at June 5, 2020 12:21 AM

That's something for which the Church will, and should, have to answer for decades, if not longer, a stain on its institutional soul.

I think that, in any venerable institution, there develops over time a mentality that the institution must be protected, above all else - to the complete abandonment of the institution's original purpose and stated principles.

We saw this trend with Penn State, Michigan State, the Boy Scouts, and with the Catholic Church. It's a disease of the institution and every institution needs to inoculate itself against that. The institution should never be placed above the people it purports to serve.

I remember watching as Cardinal Law argued that he should not be removed from office for his failure to protect the children because he was needed to protect the children. Sorry, Bernie, that was your job when only God was watching and you abdicated your responsibility. No one trusts you to do it now, not even God.

Years ago, commenter Paul said "[E]ven as an atheist I have to respect religion as the crazy hippie mother of science, law and philosophy...." I've always admired that wording. ~ Crid at June 5, 2020 12:21 AM

Nice quote. I like that.

I think the two of you are missing the point. You can't really separate religion and ideology. They are more or less synonyms. A part of the ideology of the western Catholic church stated that the world was rational and learnable. They also viewed that learning about 'God's Creation' was a good way to learn about God. Those two ideas are enough to start the current scientific revolution. Especially when you add on a culture of general literacy.

Yes, plenty of other groups made great advances in the sciences. The research of optics by the arabs, ship technologies by the Chineese, geometry from the Egyptions. The number of technologies discovered and rediscovered is countless. Clever people exist in every place and every time. Luck people too. But what happened to those technologies? Why didn't they inspire advances like we see today? They certainly had all the basic parts. Heck, it is arguable that the Romans were more technologically advanced than revolutionary Americans. There is even evidence they had steam engines. So what happened?

In most cases you only see technological advances as part of the state. The Chinese developed ship building and navigation that permitted the discovery of the Americas centuries before the Europeans. The emperors at the time supported such research. And once the emperors turned away from such things the knowledge was abandoned. The same with Muslim research into optics. Once the ruling powers were no longer interested the knowledge vanished. But in Europe you had fractured secular government. Compared to most other areas the nations of Europe were tiny. You also had fractured religious leadership. After all Martin Luther posted his theses in 1517. The Enlightenment began about 100 years later with Isaac Newton's publishing of Principia Mathematica in 1687.

So you had a culture of general literacy (had to read God's word on your own, couldn't trust those shifty priests), a belief in a rational world, a faith that knowing that rational world was 'good', and no significant centralized powers to direct things. Hence research was both wide spread and commercialized. Welcome to our modern world.

So yes the western Catholic church is very responsible for our current scientific advancements. But it was key it was a broken church. The eastern Catholic church remained an unbroken entity with near identical doctrines as its western counterpart, and no enlightenment happened.

This all has significant application to scientific advancement today. So much of our society is built on technological devices so people have advanced the idea it is imperative that the government work to further advance our research and technology. This is wrong. Like it or not but government funded research is inherently wasteful. Both in money and manpower. Instead of it being important for a central government to direct our research it is actually important for the government to stay out of it as much as possible.

The Chinese developed ship building and navigation that permitted the discovery of the Americas centuries before the Europeans. ~ Ben at June 5, 2020 8:04 AM

Zheng He's alleged voyage to the new world is pure fiction and mostly Chinese propaganda. The supposed 1418 map was far too detailed for a 30-year exploration by one fleet, given the technology of the time. Zheng's actual voyage around India and Africa was impressive, but it's highly unlikely he made it to Mexico as alleged in Gavin Menzies' book.

Columbus knew there was a land mass to the west of Europe because he read the old Viking journals. He believed the earth was smaller than it was and that the land mass was Asia. Scientists of his day knew the earth was round and had accurately calculated its size. What they didn't know was that there was a land mass to the west, between Europe and Asia.

Yes Zheng He's map is pure fiction. There is reasonable evidence that the Chinese landed in Northern California/Canada around 1300BC. At the very least there is good archaeological evidence they had all the tools needed to cross the pacific at that time. But a change in leadership and all of that progress was abandoned. Chinese ship technology was lost as the leadership abandoned external exploration in favor of internal bickering.

The US landing on the moon is actually a good parallel. In 1969 the USA put boots on the moon. In 2011 the USA lost the ability for manned space flight. Not just an inability to get to the moon but a complete loss of manned space flight.

This is a trend seen over and over through history. Technology that is not tied to commercial activity is ephemeral. Without the ability to make money knowledge is abandoned as we move from generation to generation.

This is why SpaceX is so exciting. Not only did they beat NASA back into space in both cargo and manned capacity, they are doing so for a profit. No changes in US leadership will cause us to abandon space. Even if SpaceX falls apart (and they probably will within 50-100 years) someone else will pick up the knowledge and keep advancing it as long as there is money to be made.

Governments are fickle. They cannot be trusted to advance our knowledge and capabilities.

> More likely it was the culture that
> led the Church to a belief in a
> rational world and not the other
> way around. Religion, like politics,
> is a trailing indicator.

Yeah... With rationality, you can feed your kids better food when they're hungry and give them effective medicine when they're sick. In times of crisis, those are better outcomes than fondling beads in famished terror or hearing the last rites pronounced over a bassinet.

> Nonetheless, I found the author's
> view of the interplay of cultural,
> religious, and philosophical
> influences on how people view the
> world around them to be interesting,
> if a bit biased.

Credit where due… Or it least, Contingencies as they happened: Western Civ would not have spooled out so agreeably if not for the Catholic church.

Here comes a round of Uncle Cridmo's MindGame PlayTime™!:

• Imagine that the dogmatic mentality and religious devotion of every sincere Catholic from all time could be sorta re-animated in a convocation at Sheraton somewhere. These spirits would be untroubled by their corporeal resentments (i.e., 'Those sixth-century fuckers stink of swine! Their daughters have no teeth!), and linguistic variance would not be a factor.

• Now imagine if they were each given a game-show-audience clicker with which to cast a Yes/No vote. Then, from up on the dais, you let loose with a Powerpoint show depicting the centuries of Catholic practice & doctrine in chronological order. At no point in the presentation would the attendees have given a thumbs-up to the way things were headed.

Ahem

I've lately become appalled at the bitter fervor of atheists like Harris, Pinker, Shermer, Haidt, and TC Williams. These are men I want admire, but the abject disdain in which they hold churchgoers — and their eagerness to dismiss the voices, interests and even human worthiness of those believe — indicts their own humanity in the starkest possible way. Such smug certainty in one's own judgement gets people killed.

Jesus takes all comers, no matter how humble. Intellectuals (and wannabes) are in the exclusion business.

I'm happily atheist m'self, but have learned to find peace with those who take other paths, as human nature dictates that they will. (Have you heard about teh gays? Ewwwwwwww.... Also, skin color. Etc.)

But Pinkerian vitriol isn't worth panicking about in a year when we have so much else to worry over, for two reasons.

(1.) Across the globe, religious practice is in retreat. Modernity is better.

(2.) There are still billions of religious believers, both capable of and inclined to the most aggressive expression of their cosmology. It's their fight, and they'll do what they need to do.

The Atheist Ninnies will not win in this century, and probably not for many centuries to come.

"Outcomes" should have been "responses." I will lose sleep over this.

Ben thinks we're missing the point

I respect religion. It has historically been more of a unifying force in the world than a dividing one. However, where it has divided us, that divide has been ferocious.

Like Churchill, I consider myself a supporter of the church from the outside, more a buttress than a pillar.

At best, I'm an agnostic. I have little use for the "Jesus is my best friend" religiosity of today, especially when Jesus is treated more like a servant than a best friend. Prayers are not requests for tolerance, wisdom, patience, etc., but commands as to whom he should smite today.

I was raised old-school Catholic and probably got a good part my disdain for modern religiosity from growing up in the South and witnessing one too many evangelicals who, upon being "born again" felt they had license to indulge in all sorts of misdeeds. And why not? After all, they now had a golden ticket to the hereafter.

BTW, "catholic" with a small "c" means "all-embracing." Only the Roman church capitalizes it. Eastern churches consider themselves to be catholic. So, a Catholic is an adherent of the Roman Church.

"I could hardly be called a pillar of the Church. I am more in the nature of a buttress, for I support it from the outside." ~ Winston Churchill

> more a buttress than a pillar

Stealing that.

> especially when Jesus is
> treated more like a servant
> than a best friend

Stealing that too! Not EVEN a mere best friend. The magnitude of His presence is not felt in these generations. I was named for a minister in the Methodist church; my grandfather. It might have complicated an early-teens escape from the faith, but I solved that problem by ignoring it. (He always liked me.)

I'd thought small-c catholic meant something like open-minded.

I'd thought small-c catholic meant something like open-minded. ~ Crid at June 5, 2020 2:40 PM

I only typed in the last part of the M-W definition. Open-minded fits.

I have no doubt that you know the difference between small-c catholic and capital-c Catholic. I mentioned it for those who may not - since religion, even as a topic of comparative cultural study, has been eliminated from our education system.

"Ben thinks we're missing the point" ~Crid

You are. You act like there is a difference between organized religion and any other irrational belief system. 'The Atheist Ninnies' are just as religious as the most devout church goers. They even engage in the exact same types of behavior as the hypocritical born agains. Organized religions aren't magically different. They just have more paperwork attached.

"More likely it was the culture that led the Church to a belief in a rational world and not the other way around." ~Conan

"With rationality, you can feed your kids better food when they're hungry and give them effective medicine when they're sick. In times of crisis, those are better outcomes than fondling beads in famished terror or hearing the last rites pronounced over a bassinet." ~Crid

Then why isn't this a universal value? Why did the Catholics come up with it a thousand odd years ago? The Muslims actually take the opposite view. They think that the universe is constant only for as long as God feels like keeping it constant. He may change his mind on a whim and then all your research is worthless. Which has held back research in Muslim dominated nations. The Catholics even predate the Muslims.

That said there is a trend for cultures who live in colder climates to place greater value on rationality than more equatorial cultures. But even there you find the difference between a value for rational action and a belief that the world is rational and knowable.

I think both of you are missing the value of hindsight here. I doubt either of you think widespread literacy is not needed for our modern society. It is easy to see the value today. But look at things from the position of a society that isn't already literate. Seeing the value of educating a class of scribes or nobles for the purpose of tax collection and long distance communication is easy. But realizing the value in educating every mud digging peasant is hard. Educating only 10% or 20% gets you nothing. It is when you see 70% literacy and up that big benefits start happening. Well, that is a lot of investment with no payout. So most societies didn't do that. Instead you need some random half retarded reason to get things started. Like having 'holy scripture' everyone needs to know and not trusting the priesthood.

As for the word catholic, it is just old greek for universal. Same as bible is old greek for book. Everything is sexier when it's in a foreign language.

> You act like there is a
> difference between

You're a thinker, Ben!

> religion, even as a topic of
> comparative cultural study, has
> been eliminated from our education

Yes, and as noted above, the guys I'd count on most to help clear things up are too busy being smug. (BTW, they're all guys. I couldn't [offhand] think of a woman I read and admire who's so eager to pretend religion can, should or will just go away.)

All these agitation groups are a mystery to me, but I've read about some who've grown out of 4chan and a few other venues... Google "Electric Boogaloo" and "Hawaiian Shirts." The guys who are trying to stir things up in nasty little ways seem lonely more than they seem ideological. They're transparently desperate for fellowship in something exclusive and clever.

And we've all been saying on this blog since it began, and for fifteen years before that: Liberalism is filling the space in lefty hearts formerly taken by religion. It's just howlingly obvious, with too many examples to choose from… All this PC & safe-space & wokedness is just competitive sanctimony.

Absolutely!— Education's failed, and TV/Hollywood fucked up everyone's understanding of what's attractive in others, and consumer culture has coarsened our sensitivities to blahblah....

But I don't understand how so many millions, hundreds of millions, up and down the economic and intellectual spectra, came to adulthood without learning that the religious impulse — and the aches which it can so reliably balm — are present in everyone.

I mean, this won't work. Endless resentment and streetfighting and woke-dicklength contests and "a transformative new model of public safety" aren't going to give people the sheltering culture they need. Rich people will hire muscle, and the rest will protect themselves as best they can...

But if this madness doesn't end soon, there will have to come a moment where all these assholes say 'Holy shit, *I'm* part of the problem.' So, like, that (and a few thousand dead in the streets and uncountable financial devastation) would be the worst case. I can't believe all the virtue and humility in the United States just up and vanished in February.