I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
'Ain't no god in Mexico' - Waylon Jennings 'God Isn't Real' - Robbie Fulks
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
(1/4) I saw the chat last night on the current covid state, so I, inevitably, have decided to put in my semi-informed two penn’orth. Which is: we’re in the third Omicron wave. Around one in thirty of us have covid right now (up from a low of one in seventy). For some, it’s a summer cold. For others, it’s a nasty flu. For a few, it’s severe enough for hospitalisation, even with the immunity levels we’ve got.
This is the end state as it stands. You will catch covid an average of 1-4 times per year. All of us will. Some will be lucky and miss a year or two; others will be unlucky and catch it at every wave. And reinfections aren't necessarily less nasty than the previous infection.
I’ve had real ‘flu maybe three or four times in my life (rather than a bad cold). That’s a bit under once per decade, and I think that’s pretty representative. You probably get just under one real case of flu per decade. You will catch covid 10-40 times over the next decade, unless something changes. So will each of your loved ones.
There is also the question of what proportion of hospitalisations are FOR rather than WITH covid. We don’t need to speculate, the figures are published. It’s about 36% right now (up from 30% at the low). But it’s still WAY below the 70-80% in the pre-Omicron and pre-vaccine days. Don’t get me wrong, those with incidental covid are not irrelevant. You still have to isolate them, it causes complexities in treatment, and worsens prognoses (there are no cases where “Oh, and you’ve got covid as well,” is a positive phrase to hear if you’re hospitalised and vulnerable due to something else). But it’s still qualitatively different from “You’ve caught covid so bad you’ve been rushed to hospital due to covid itself.”
And, yes, we still have a baseline of about 50 people per day dying FROM covid, who would have lived otherwise.
We will have between 1 million and 5 million people in the UK with covid; it’ll vary as the waves come and go. These are hitting fairly regularly – we had the original Omicron wave in December/January, the BA.2 wave in March/April, and now the BA.4/5 wave in June/July.
(Which implies that February and May were good months, and maybe August will be as well).
This makes me quite fearful. I have been told in no uncertain terms to avoid future lung infections. I also have a condition which makes me prone to blood clots, which I've had and which are also pretty unpleasant. So I try to do this. Even so I got a nasty bout of bronchitis earlier this year.
If this is going to be widespread, I am going to have to resign myself to living largely in the open air and staying away from crowded inside spaces. Fortunately, this is relatively easy to do in the Lakes. But still it's not ideal.
I'm sorry. As @turbotubbs points out, there are factors that could shift the endemic levels downwards. If the Government do get moving on HEPA and far-UV air filters, indoors could be almost as safe as outdoors. And if it looks like this endemic level with rollercoaster swings is here to stay, sooner or later, they're going to have to look at what minimally disruptive things they could do, surely?
And if you're eligible for a fourth dose, taking it seems to help considerably (A fourteen-fold reduction in mortality between 3-dose and 4-dose vulnerable people found in Israel).
And I do wish your husband and daughter a speedy and full recovery.
The infuriating thing is, due to the crazy mad live experiment that America has basically run on the effects of various covid restrictions, we know that for indoor gatherings masks and, above all, ventilation make staggeringly huge differences to transmission rate.
That school ventilation is not the number 1 priority of every government at the moment is absurd.
Can't really see how you can argue there wasn't an attempted Coup? That it failed was incompetence and because a handful of key players resisted. Rafflensperger (sp.?), Pence, Cheney and Hutchinson. And doubtless a few others. But it was an attempted Coup. By a mafia Don. He was well named.
I said there wouldn’t be a coup.
There was no coup.
However one describes the disgraceful, shambolic scenes on 6 January, a coup it was not.
Well. It wasn't a successful Coup. I'll give you that.
It wasn't a successful riot. It wasn't even an attempted coup.
5 dead. What was the intention?
Of course it was a bloody coup (attempt). It’s just that Luckyboy is conditioned (as we all are) to think of them as things that happen in third world countries.
No, it was not. You can repeat it as often as you like; it isn't going to get any truer. There was no attempted coup, because there was no attempt, intention, or plan, to take over the Government of the United States. There wasn't a botched plan, or a fatally-flawed plan, or even an insanely stupid plan, there. wasn't. a. plan. Nobody invading the Capitol that day thought that they were taking over the Government of the US. I find it a bit sad that so many on a forum with a very high level of discussion are prepared to abandon basic fact 'because Trump'. It's disappointingly weak minded.
It appears that there was a plan to take over the Government of the United States, or at least to prevent the relinquishing of power.
The plan was multi-farious, but included the use of a violent mob to suborn, immobilise or perhaps murder the Vice President.
It doesn't appear that there was anything of the sort. As you are perfectly well aware, everything that Trump did, said, or thought in the election aftermath (true or otherwise it would appear from posts upthread) is now being flung in the coup casserole in the hopes that it ammounts to something coup-like. Well quite clearly it doesn't. Even if there were a plan or intention to lynch the VP, it wouldn't have gained the rioters power, or affected the election outcome. Sorry to be dull, but definitions are quite important.
How is that pin head you are dancing on? Pretty empty I guess. Does it never cross your mind that if everyone else thinks it was a coup except you then you might be wrong (Trump followers excluded).
Shall we exclude Biden followers as well, if he want to be fair?
The violence was awful but it was not a coup nor a coup attempt. It was a violent mob that thought it would be a great idea to storm a political institution because they didn't like the outcome. Was the attempted storming by a pro-abortion crowd of the Arizona Senate an attempted coup against the Arizona state government?
Not really. There was no way the rioters were ever going to change the outcome or the Government. They rioted because they were angry and cried foul over an outcome where they lost - which is what happened in AZ
I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
Also people who really wanted to get rich making African people work for nothing on land taken by force from the indigenous population. It's no wonder racism is at the heart of the States.
I wonder where they got the idea from.
The Spanish, the Portugese, the Romans and every other empire in history before them?
Slavery was not a new concept, the slave trade wasn't new either, what was new was egalitarianism and abolitionism.
Sitting on continent A arranging wholesale deportation of natives of continent B to continent C for pure commercial gain, was entirely new. Furthermore slavery had been not a thing for so long in the UK that any claim of continuity is ridiculous.
The Portuguese and (less so) Spanish concentrated their efforts further South.Black African Americans are the product of Anglo Scottish greed.
It was not remotely new. The Romans had intercontinental slave trading, the only reason they didn't involve the Americas was because their jurisdiction didn't go that far but they did trade slaves between three continents.
Balls. Eurasia is really just one continent, it's only the fact of the Greeks making definitions which makes us think otherwise, and it is joined to Africa
The Romans had child brothels too, so I assume we are cool with those.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Because sound is defined in terms of vibrations and eardrums, so you need an eardrum?
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
Please don't Bohr us any more with your Fermi; keep your Max Planck to yourself.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
You've misunderstood Schrodinger. The cat may be alive or dead, there's no way of knowing without observing, but if the box is still sealed and you can hear the cat meowing it is safe to infer that the cat is alive.
If someone random is in a room and we can observe no information about them, then they might or might not be a perv. If we know they're using a pair of binoculars . . . then the observation has been made.
The wave function has collapsed, we now have a single eigenstate, and a perv has been identified.
I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
That is why the founding fathers put separation of Church and State at the heart of the bill of rights, so future generations of Americans wouldn't face religious persecution themselves and would have freedom to choose which religion, if any, they wanted to follow and how to practice it.
Sadly the modern "religious right" wants to implement religious persecution themselves. They have become what American founders tried to flee and prevent.
Not quite.
The Puritans who went to the States were anti-Catholic and certainly would not have tolerated Catholics in their states, which is why Maryland was specifically set up to act as a refuge for persecuted Catholics. A lot of the underlying factor why the States went for the Church and State separation was that there was a natural disagreement over what religion would have been the state religion given the interests of Puritans / Episcopalians and (to a lesser degree in 1776) Catholics.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The sensation of sound is a construct of the brain. Up to that point, it is only a pressure wave.
My main interest in Scottish independence is what whisky and other smuggling opportunities there may be, living as I do close to the border and the coast with lots of coves for fishing boats. I rather fancy a Whisky Galore-style retirement.
Having revealed that desire - HMRC will be adding you to their watchlists..
Given that HMRC can't even answer the phone to genuine queries, that is not very scary.
HMRC's current modus operandi seems to be open case - do nothing for 15 years and then present a very large bill with 50%+ interest on top.
So while it's not immediately scary there are longer term issues.
15 years, eh ....... after Scottish independence.
* checks mortality rates ..... and Irish passport *
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Interesting. My researches over a similar period show my paternal ancestors virtually all from Southwest Wales although from quite a large number of villages. My maternal ancestors were all from Bedfordshire although again spread over a number of communities. DNA though suggests that one of my maternal ancestors was Swedish!
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
I agree. Interesting though how intention is key, here. Would any of us object to Leon watching through his binoculars a particularly accomplished paddleboarder* and admiring the athleticism and grace? Same physical action, different intentions.
*Might be hard to make the case for a paddleboarder being a spectacle to watch, but a couple of years back, I spent some time watching, with my then three year old, some kite surfers through binoculars, admiring what they were doing, which was quite spectacular - jumps many metres into the air. The was Beadnell bay so they were in full wetsuits and - I think - they were male. Safe to say there was no perving taking place.
I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
You could easily draw a line from there to here. The question is whether this is something which is good or not. And if it is accepted that the US is a religious fundamentalist state how does that put into perspective our view of other religious fundamentalist states.
Issues need separating out here. The USA has like us a Christian, religious foundation, going back to days when that's how everything was - not all that long ago.
The UK, if history had been different, could be a religious theocracy now. (The Economist appears to believe, fatuously, that it is). Christian monarch, established and endowed church (in England), Bishops in HoL, church schools, a church or churches in every tiny corner of the land, a recognisable class of clergy, all ancient Oxbridge colleges and public schools with a continuing Christian foundation; HoC starting each day with Christian prayers. Daily Christian worship on the state broadcaster
The stuff is in place to be a Christian theocracy if we wanted to. But you couldn't be more wrong if you think it is.
Same with America, but the people have chosen a slightly different path from similar foundations.
Edmund Burke would understand.
And, BTW, even in USA most religious people are not fundamentalists. They just make more noise.
The difference is most Christians in America are Roman Catholics or Protestant evangelicals, while most Christians in the UK are less hardline Anglican. Thanks in part to the Church of England being the established church
Also the societal pressure to get ahead by being seen in the right church has largely died out in this country.
I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
Also people who really wanted to get rich making African people work for nothing on land taken by force from the indigenous population. It's no wonder racism is at the heart of the States.
Slavery wasn't really at the heart of the US founding. The Puritans came to flee persecution.
Re the slaves in the American hemisphere, Irish rebels under Cromwell were sent to the West Indies to work in essentially slave-like conditions. It was when their supply dried up, that planters in Barbados turned more to the African slave trade.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
You've misunderstood Schrodinger. The cat may be alive or dead, there's no way of knowing without observing, but if the box is still sealed and you can hear the cat meowing it is safe to infer that the cat is alive.
If someone random is in a room and we can observe no information about them, then they might or might not be a perv. If we know they're using a pair of binoculars . . . then the observation has been made.
The wave function has collapsed, we now have a single eigenstate, and a perv has been identified.
Lucky for me then that I've now gone inside my apartment to have a wank, while thinking about beautiful thoroughbred horses, cantering through glittering surf with their shining hooves
Former Armed Forces minister Lord Andrew Robathan shared his outrage at the decreasing size of the UK military in the wake of the raging war in Ukraine.
GB News presenter Nigel Farage probed Lord Robathan on why the Conservatives have continued to cut the Ministry of Defence (MoD) budget since 2010.
Lord Robathan acknowledged that "changes need to happen" but condemned the Government for "whittling the army, navy and airforce" down to dangerous levels, stating how the country is now in a "ridiculous situation".
Utterly disgusting; hugely against the national interest.
Isn't it all an inevitable result of our decades long trade deficit, that we keep on selling off assets in order to balance the books?
No. We are perfectly free to impose what restrictions we like.
It is also questionable where our trade deficit is as it is still all rebalancing.
Kwasi Kwarteng is being a fool. Letting a Eurofighter supplier come under US control will put participation in future programmes at risk.
He's also approved the sale of a similarly big supplier, Ultra Electronics. That is being sold to a setup called Advent International who gave lots of assurances before previously buying Cobham, which assurances Amber Rudd dribbled all over Parliament back in about 2018. In reality Cobham was dismembered within 18 months.
Our defence industry is getting some export success, and Kwasi Kwarteng pisses it away. He needs to be hit over the head 100 times with a (metaphorical) cluebat with "strategic autonomy" picked out on it in 6" nails.
The US threatened to withhold defence cooperation if we didn't, so he might not have had much choice.
Exactly, if the Second Assistant Deputy to the Secretary of Defence in the Pentagon picks up the phone and says to KK, "We want this to happen." What choice do they have?
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Or alternatively it was a far-sighted perception of the unfathomable complexities of quantum science well before these were even imagined ?
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
"Touching yourself" FFS. Reminds me of a woman I heard on the radio who worked on a sex chat line and said she could sometimes hear the guys on the far end interfering with themselves
What about projecting a mental image of a previously observed paddleboarder? Asking faf.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Maybe, though I have my doubts, but more interestingly, perhaps, is that even if you can prove direct descent from Alfred the Great, and you assume no adultery was involved, the chance that you have inherited any of Alfred's DNA is very slim. The way in which DNA is signed and diced when gametes are created means that you don't inherit one-eighth of your DNA from each great-grandparent. It's all a lot more random than that.
Inheritance of mitochondrial DNA, down the matrilineal line, is the only inheritance that can be relied upon.
That's something I've never understood. If mitochondrial DNA isn't sliced and diced itself, then how come we don't all basically have the same mitochondrial DNA in the first place?
I guess the rate of mutation in the mitochondrial DNA must be greater than the tendency for us all to have the same common female ancestor.
As I understand it the rate of mutation in mitochondrial DNA has been used as a clock to estimate the existence of an evolutionary bottleneck coincident with a very large volcanic eruption some trends of thousands of years ago.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
You've misunderstood Schrodinger. The cat may be alive or dead, there's no way of knowing without observing, but if the box is still sealed and you can hear the cat meowing it is safe to infer that the cat is alive.
If someone random is in a room and we can observe no information about them, then they might or might not be a perv. If we know they're using a pair of binoculars . . . then the observation has been made.
The wave function has collapsed, we now have a single eigenstate, and a perv has been identified.
Lucky for me then that I've now gone inside my apartment to have a wank, while thinking about beautiful thoroughbred horses, cantering through glittering surf with their shining hooves
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
... (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony)...
Even more like when you are at home in your flat than we had imagined....
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It was quite surprising how far some people walked!
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
How do you know?
People left diaries! And sometimes quite ordinary people, for example the diaries of Thomas Jenkins of Llandeilo, Carmarthenshire. Worth a read!
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It was quite surprising how far some people walked!
Hasn't the idea that we all stayed put in our little villages been revealed as a myth?
Just thinking back to the Stonehenge Exhibition at the British Museum: people buried at the henge came from Denmark and France and beyond, in their lifetimes
Then there's Otzi the prehistoric iceman. Descended from Corsicans, died crossing a mountain pass between modern Italy and Austria
@Leon really should be nominated for some type of award for the way that he manages eventually to turn pretty much every thread, no matter what the topic, onto a discussion about his sex life and/or sex fantasies - overlaid with some pretentious philosophical twaddle.
(1/4) I saw the chat last night on the current covid state, so I, inevitably, have decided to put in my semi-informed two penn’orth. Which is: we’re in the third Omicron wave. Around one in thirty of us have covid right now (up from a low of one in seventy). For some, it’s a summer cold. For others, it’s a nasty flu. For a few, it’s severe enough for hospitalisation, even with the immunity levels we’ve got.
This is the end state as it stands. You will catch covid an average of 1-4 times per year. All of us will. Some will be lucky and miss a year or two; others will be unlucky and catch it at every wave. And reinfections aren't necessarily less nasty than the previous infection.
I’ve had real ‘flu maybe three or four times in my life (rather than a bad cold). That’s a bit under once per decade, and I think that’s pretty representative. You probably get just under one real case of flu per decade. You will catch covid 10-40 times over the next decade, unless something changes. So will each of your loved ones.
There is also the question of what proportion of hospitalisations are FOR rather than WITH covid. We don’t need to speculate, the figures are published. It’s about 36% right now (up from 30% at the low). But it’s still WAY below the 70-80% in the pre-Omicron and pre-vaccine days. Don’t get me wrong, those with incidental covid are not irrelevant. You still have to isolate them, it causes complexities in treatment, and worsens prognoses (there are no cases where “Oh, and you’ve got covid as well,” is a positive phrase to hear if you’re hospitalised and vulnerable due to something else). But it’s still qualitatively different from “You’ve caught covid so bad you’ve been rushed to hospital due to covid itself.”
And, yes, we still have a baseline of about 50 people per day dying FROM covid, who would have lived otherwise.
We will have between 1 million and 5 million people in the UK with covid; it’ll vary as the waves come and go. These are hitting fairly regularly – we had the original Omicron wave in December/January, the BA.2 wave in March/April, and now the BA.4/5 wave in June/July.
(Which implies that February and May were good months, and maybe August will be as well).
This makes me quite fearful. I have been told in no uncertain terms to avoid future lung infections. I also have a condition which makes me prone to blood clots, which I've had and which are also pretty unpleasant. So I try to do this. Even so I got a nasty bout of bronchitis earlier this year.
If this is going to be widespread, I am going to have to resign myself to living largely in the open air and staying away from crowded inside spaces. Fortunately, this is relatively easy to do in the Lakes. But still it's not ideal.
I'm sorry. As @turbotubbs points out, there are factors that could shift the endemic levels downwards. If the Government do get moving on HEPA and far-UV air filters, indoors could be almost as safe as outdoors. And if it looks like this endemic level with rollercoaster swings is here to stay, sooner or later, they're going to have to look at what minimally disruptive things they could do, surely?
And if you're eligible for a fourth dose, taking it seems to help considerably (A fourteen-fold reduction in mortality between 3-dose and 4-dose vulnerable people found in Israel).
And I do wish your husband and daughter a speedy and full recovery.
The infuriating thing is, due to the crazy mad live experiment that America has basically run on the effects of various covid restrictions, we know that for indoor gatherings masks and, above all, ventilation make staggeringly huge differences to transmission rate.
That school ventilation is not the number 1 priority of every government at the moment is absurd.
Yes, in Ireland the government is intending to give itself the legal power to mandate masking over the winter - just in case - but discussion over improving ventilation has ceased.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
"Touching yourself" FFS. Reminds me of a woman I heard on the radio who worked on a sex chat line and said she could sometimes hear the guys on the far end interfering with themselves
What about projecting a mental image of a previously observed paddleboarder? Asking faf.
Sounds like the customer satisfaction part of the job tbh
On the referendum the SC set out the position extremely clearly in a unanimous decision quite recently when the SG tried to incorporate a UN Convention on the rights of the Child which impinged on the rights reserved to the UK Parliament. This is the SC press release on the matter: https://www.supremecourt.uk/press-summary/uksc-2021-0079.html
It seemed to me that Lord Reed went well beyond what was necessary for the particular case to spell out the process in detail and the various safeguards built into the Scotland Act. Specifically in this case the first step is getting the Law Officers in Scotland to confirm that the bill is compatible; secondly the chair of the Parliament doing likewise (although failure to get this does not stop the bill outright) and thirdly the right to refer the Bill when passed to the SC for a ruling.
It remains to be seen if Sturgeon is able to short circuit this. It is entirely possible that the SC will decline to consider the bill until the other stages have been complied with. Even if they do they will follow the reasoning set out in the earlier case which makes it clear that Holyrood cannot pass legislation which impinges in any respect on reserved matters. This path is a dead end and Sturgeon must know it.
Her alternative of an election is much more complicated because in theory elections are about many things and are influenced by many factors. In a multiparty election nuances between parties can make the answer less than clear cut. Parties may want to take issue with the SNP's incompetence in building ferries, running schools and hospitals granting guarantees, and the disappointingly dry event that took place in the local brewery.
The idea of 'election as referendum' is nonsense of course. That is privately agreed by all. The idea that the SC will jump in to give the SG powers they didn't know they had is pretty fanciful, even if Lady Hale were still around.
The idea that Scots will vote a majority for, in due course, a hard border at Berwick and Gretna, pretending to be anti-nuclear while remaining in NATO (Scots have pride), losing the pound and the BoE, and losing English cash is nearly as fanciful.
So although the debate and discussion will be great, not least for the excellent and regular posts from the charming and insightful supporters of the SNP/the nationalist project here, the entire trompe l'oeil is a valiant and successful attempt to keep the Scottish political process in the hands of the SNP and a multitude of jobs for the boys, and girls, in Edinburgh and Westminster.
I'm not so sure - Sturgeon wants the referendum now because Bozo is, for her and the SNP, the perfect candidate to lead the Stay campaign.
Someone who 80% of the scottish population hates...
That's another interesting point. Will Labour front for Better Together 2 this time round? Will there even be an alliance of the Unionists with Mr Johnson around?
Given SLab's current bleat is that all this indy nonsense is distracting from the main task of getting rid of Boris and Wee Doogie Ross apparently (it's only Wednesday so this may change by Friday) thinks he should go, perhaps they can join together and form a Bettertogether without BJ campaign.
Though they're not noted for learning lessons north of Gretna, I would imagine that after their last indy ref experience Lab will remain at arms lenght from the Cons, BJ in charge or not. SKS will quack on about constitutional conventions and a mummified Brown will be wheeled around the country and revivified to do his thing.
I've obviously lost track - is that Mr Ross's 3rd u-turn on Mr J? Not being a very good Unionist, is he? And I'd clean forgot Brownzilla. It'll be like old times, rather like Diana Ross and Mick Jagger at Glasto, only not so pretty.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
"Touching yourself" FFS. Reminds me of a woman I heard on the radio who worked on a sex chat line and said she could sometimes hear the guys on the far end interfering with themselves
What about projecting a mental image of a previously observed paddleboarder? Asking faf.
Sounds like the customer satisfaction part of the job tbh
At one point when I was abroad I used to hang out with some working girls (long story).
They said the art was to make sure the guy was all done before they had finished undressing.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
"Touching yourself" FFS. Reminds me of a woman I heard on the radio who worked on a sex chat line and said she could sometimes hear the guys on the far end interfering with themselves
What about projecting a mental image of a previously observed paddleboarder? Asking faf.
Sounds like the customer satisfaction part of the job tbh
TBH this particular thread is beginning to border upon the obscene!
@Leon really should be nominated for some type of award for the way that he manages eventually to turn pretty much every thread, no matter what the topic, onto a discussion about his sex life and/or sex fantasies - overlaid with some pretentious philosophical twaddle.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
@Leon really should be nominated for some type of award for the way that he manages eventually to turn pretty much every thread, no matter what the topic, onto a discussion about his sex life and/or sex fantasies - overlaid with some pretentious philosophical twaddle.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It was quite surprising how far some people walked!
And regularly too - one thinks of drovers taking 'black cattle' from, say, Skye to the London meat market (though IIRC sometimes the cattle stopped off on the way to be bought and then taken on by someone else, ditto fattening nearer london).
PS There's at least one case of the drover sending his dog home with coins tied up on its collar - it called in at the drovers' pubs and the innkeepers fed the hound all the way home, everyone knew each other so well ...
I am currently watching Nashville (2013-2018) for (very) light relief. In it there is a storyline wherein one of the characters (they are all C&W music stars based in....) is quoted out of context saying "there is no god".
It is then taken as understood that if such words were spoken it would be the end of her career and features people burning her albums, demonstrating against her, and assaulting her. The story nowhere (yet) includes some eg east coast liberal, or "enlightened" local saying how bonkers it is; the show is just portraying as a given what the reaction is or would be.
Then as now it illustrates how America is, at heart, a religious fundamentalist state.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
Also people who really wanted to get rich making African people work for nothing on land taken by force from the indigenous population. It's no wonder racism is at the heart of the States.
Slavery wasn't really at the heart of the US founding. The Puritans came to flee persecution.
Re the slaves in the American hemisphere, Irish rebels under Cromwell were sent to the West Indies to work in essentially slave-like conditions. It was when their supply dried up, that planters in Barbados turned more to the African slave trade.
The Puritans came to flee religious persecution, the planters came to make money, and they've been arguing ever since. Slavery was absolutely at the heart of the founding of the US, it is right there interwoven into its founding documents and even surviving aspects like the electoral college have their origin in the institution.
We already had the whole "Irish slaves in Barbados" argument, it is basically an alt-right meme with at best limited basis in fact. I used to live in Barbados BTW so am well versed in its unfortunately rather unpleasant history.
(4/4) Would they actually reduce infections like that? What about: "I thought the vaccines don’t stop you getting Omicron. Or covid at all."
Have you seen the levels of infection and speed of rise? We’ve got an Rt of maybe 1.4. With a virus five to ten times as infectious as original strain covid (which was about 2.4 to 3.0). That means it “should” be somewhere in the 12-30 range. With exponential growth, multiplying by 12 every cycle rather than 1.4 means the ONS prevalence levels should go up within a couple of weeks until it’s a vertical line and the spreadsheet simply says “everyone.”
So, no, it doesn’t stop it dead. It’s not a suit of armour. But it does bounce off quite a bit. If it takes five attempts to get through, down from twenty, it’s reduced your infection level by a lot. People use the seatbelt analogy, and it’s a good one. Seat belts and airbags don’t stop you from dying in a car crash. But they reduce the rate a long way.
“But what about the cost and disruption of rolling them out?”
What disruption? It wouldn’t be the desperate “get jabs in arms NOW so we can release NPIs” of 2021. It’d be more like the winter flu jab regime.
And cost-wise: well you blow past the price of a jab within five minutes of presenting to hospital. And if it saves one day off work per year, you’ve more than made up the difference, haven’t you? Zero covid? Yeah, people still talk about that, but it’s not happening. It would need simultaneous eradication of covid worldwide, and we can’t do that with vaccines, so we’d need a worldwide lockdown at China levels with perfect adherence. No, that’s never happening. It’s here, we’re living with it; we merely have to select how we live with it.
Caution for the most vulnerable, regular boosters, reformulating for the latest strain (and here, the fact that covid seems to be stuck on the Omicron branch of the evolutionary tree is very helpful), HEPA filters, and possibly an increase in hospital capacity make the difference.
Andy - great set of posts. I agree almost totally, except that we really don't know the future. Some are suggesting we will be stuck in this loop forever, with as you say up to 4 bouts of covid each a year. I am not convinced by this. Its certainly true that omicron is great at evading pre-existing neutralising antibodies, but the vaccines and infections have hammered the potential for serious disease. At the moment covid has become stuck at omicron (variants of). Its possible, if not likely that a new variant will emerge in time that is from a different branch, or significantly different to warrant its own designation. But its also quite possible that two or three goes at omicron will lead to a much lower chance of future infections.
I, along with many others, have still not had covid (that I know of).
As to what we do - totally agree on air quality and its frankly a disgrace that government isn't doing a moonshot to do this in every hospital ward, care home and school classroom.
I also agree about treating people who choose to wear a mask with respect. You cannot know their reasons - they may well be clinically vulnerable but also wish to live their lives. It does cut both ways.
So - thanks for taking the time to lay that out.
Edit - Care home, not car home, which is of course a garage...
Andy is as informative as ever, but I'm going to take it further than @turbotubbs - it seems like potentially catastrophizing from the worst case scenarios for individuals, and from one current variant.
What I still don't understand is how many people seem to be dodging this. Unless my possible brush with Wuhan strain in December/Jan 2019/20 and triple Pfizer have conferred immense levels of immunity, it seems somewhat bizaare that I haven't ever had a confirmed case of Covid. I haven't worn a mask since the middle of last year, I have travelled all over Britain and Europe. I work in a shop. Most of my friends have kids and we spend time together. I have been to conferences with hundreds of people. I have had meals and boozy evenings with people who 24 hours later tested positive.
I don't know anyone who has had covid more than twice.
So where are the 4 times a year predictions coming from??
It appears that in an endemic state (including with waves), the number of times per year on average people get infected is approximately 52/(duration_infectiousness+duration_effective_immunity), where you measure these durations in weeks. duration_infectiousness is about 1 week. duration_effective_immunity can be inferred from the average prevalence level. Prevalence level with be given by (1-1/R0)/(1+ duration_effective_immunity / duration_infectiousness).
(Which means that when R0 is on the high side, it's almost irrelevant).
Which implies that at the below prevalences, the number of times infected on average will go:
2% - 1.1x 3% - 1.6x 4% - 2.2x 5% - 2.7x 6% - 3.3 x 7% - 3.9 x
Looking at the Omicron waves in England and in Scotland, it would imply that 2% and 7% are the extremes of where we'd expect the average endemic state to end up - as it stands at the moment.
And, of course, the average would have some wiggle around it. There are some, like you, me, and turbotubbs, who have escaped it so far when the average is over 1. There are some who have already had it three or four times. So if the average is around 2.2x (if average prevalence shakes out at 4%), a range of 1-4 would be about right.
BREAKING: @Potus announces new US military deployments to Europe: 1. Create permanent HQ for US 5th Army Corps in Poland 2. Deploy additional rotational brigade to Romania 3. Deploy 2 additional F-35 squadrons to the UK 4. "Enhance" rotational deployments in Baltics 5. Deploy 2 additional Navy destroyers to Spain, bringing total from 4 to 6 6. Deploy "additional" air defense to Germany, Italy “At a moment Putin has shattered peace in Europe... US and allies are stepping up, proving NATO is more needed than ever, and more important than ever"
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It was quite surprising how far some people walked!
Hasn't the idea that we all stayed put in our little villages been revealed as a myth?
Just thinking back to the Stonehenge Exhibition at the British Museum: people buried at the henge came from Denmark and France and beyond, in their lifetimes
Then there's Otzi the prehistoric iceman. Descended from Corsicans, died crossing a mountain pass between modern Italy and Austria
Seems obvious that some people, perhaps even most people, would have moved around a lot less then than now, including to the extent of not leaving the village. Even one of my wife's grandmothers could probably count the number of times she'd left the County on one hand.
I think it's fair to say that they're was a time in the past when visiting London would have been more exotic than visiting New York is today.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I am not particularly convinced that Unionism is a popular policy in England, whether of the Scottish or Irish persuasion. Obviously potent for Unionist communities in those countries, but in England I think there are only a few HYUFD tankies, the rest would just shrug, or even encourage the Scots or Irish to go.
I think in HYUFD think and perhaps more generally it is tied up with monarchy. The union of the crowns was a necessary precondition of the union proper at a time when these things mattered.
Er, doesn't make sense. The monarchy is not particularly under threat in Scotland, independence or not.
It shouldn't be.
It's basically Scottish.
Louis XVI, basically French
Tsar Nicholas II basically Russian
Etc
I would have thought our Royal Family was German first (the Georgians), then Dutch (William of Orange), then Scottish (James 6th / 1st) and then Norman. The Royal Family have never been English as before the Normans it was Anglo Saxon and there wasn't such a thing as a single country called England.
Not quite. Biologically of course it's a complete mishmash, like the rest of us, and (sotto voce) in any line of descent the matrilineal line is pretty reliable while it is a wise child who knows who their father is, as any female mallard will testify.
But history being what it is some lines matter a little more than others. The fact that HM the Queen is a direct descendent of Alfred the Great (assuming the ducks and drakes of history are all telling the truth) matters more than that she is a collateral descendent of Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, though much history turns on that remarkable relationship.
I remember Charles Moore alleging in the Spectator once that HM the Queen was a direct descendent of the Prophet through Pedro the Cruel. It would add to the lustre as far as I am concerned it that were the case.
A massive reward of honour awaits anyone who could prove reliably the descent of HM the Queen from antiquity (pre c500 AD). Astonishingly it can't be done for her, or anyone else in the west. if it could, it certainly would not be English/British.
I can “provably” trace my descent back to Maud Ingelric, the supposed concubine of William the Conqueror, who married a Normam Knight, Ranulph Peverel. it was the lordly Peverels who later went west into Cornwall, where they eventually became minor gentry, and in some cases really quite poor
Using online genealogies I traced Ingelric and Co back to Roman senators, and a Nordic god of ice and fire
Complete bollocks of course, but great fun. The trouble is the end of the Roman Empire in the west severed nearly all family trees between 400-600AD. I suppose the only way you could provably trace descent from antiquity would be if you descended from Byzantine aristos who might then, in turn, be traceable back to Roman times?
Today everybody of broadly British descent is descended from William the Conqueror.
" You have two parents, and they had two parents and so on, two by two, so the number of ancestors doubles each generation working up your family tree, meaning that by 1600, one person should have 32,768 ancestors. This assumes full outbreeding, which is very unlikely – we’re all inbred over a long enough period – but for our purposes makes little difference.
Therefore, each one of your 32,768 ancestors in the year 1600 has a 0.5 per cent chance of being direct descendants of Edward III. If you reverse the question, and ask ‘what are the chances that none of your 32,768 ancestors in 1600 are in that 0.5 per cent’, the calculation becomes
0.995 x 10^32,768 = 4.64^-72
Which is an absurdly small number."
"Full outbreeding" is an absurd assumption - if it were right the world pop in 1600 would be in at least the trillions - and it makes all the difference
To expose the fallacy: Let's take the remotest inhabited island in the South Pacific and assume it had a population of 30 in 1600. If you add those to the mix the chances that none of them were not direct descendants of E III don't materially change, but we can look at *geography* and say the result is absurd. So, were there factors in UK society which isolated populations as effectively as the ocean? Bloody right there were. Geographically, everywhere in rural England was so isolated that the invention of the bicycle seriously stirred the gene pool because people started screwing people in the next door village not their own. Secondly social class: I am sure it didn't never happen that a gay young aristocratic blade swived a comely wench as he happened to be passing, but see 1. above: the average comely wench probably lived out a life without actually encountering a gay young blade, or anyone other than a peasant who was also multiple times over her cousin.
That doesn't stand up to scrutiny though. Anyone who has investigated their family tree going back a to say 1800 (which is easily doable for most people) will see they have ancestors from across Britain.
So far, in 1800 I have found ancestors in Perthshire, Fife, County Waterford, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Cumbria, London, Hampshire, Surrey and Sussex - and my ancestors during that period are largely ordinary working class people.
Also, you can apply *very* high levels of interbreeding to the calculation above and you still end up with 99.9999...% probability of descent from William the Conqueror.
Observation bias: the sort of people who investigate their ancestors, find that they have ancestors from all over the shop..
Hah! I can see how that might work the other way - people who never bother to investigate their ancestors assume they all lived in the same hamlet for the past 1,000 years.
People who do investigate find out the actual facts, of course. Those results are surprising. When I started I genuinely expected to find all my ancestors in Sussex and in London, where my mum and dad each came from.
Also, there was a big shake-up pre-bicycle in the 18th C with improvements in turnpikes and shipping, growth of cities, and then railways. lot more stagnant before all that.
It was quite surprising how far some people walked!
And regularly too - one thinks of drovers taking 'black cattle' from, say, Skye to the London meat market (though IIRC sometimes the cattle stopped off on the way to be bought and then taken on by someone else, ditto fattening nearer london).
PS There's at least one case of the drover sending his dog home with coins tied up on its collar - it called in at the drovers' pubs and the innkeepers fed the hound all the way home, everyone knew each other so well ...
They used to swim the cattle across to Kylerhea.
Edit: To Glenelg sorry. Forgot which side was which.
@Leon really should be nominated for some type of award for the way that he manages eventually to turn pretty much every thread, no matter what the topic, onto a discussion about his sex life and/or sex fantasies - overlaid with some pretentious philosophical twaddle.
The Schrodinger W**k Award perhaps.
Does that mean the marriage is........ off???
*horrified face emoji*
You don't get out of it that easily .....
I'm rather enjoying this prolonged long-distance courtship, if that's the right word.
And I may need to make a sudden escape away from the HMRC's clutches and you seem ideally suited for that.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
@Leon really should be nominated for some type of award for the way that he manages eventually to turn pretty much every thread, no matter what the topic, onto a discussion about his sex life and/or sex fantasies - overlaid with some pretentious philosophical twaddle.
The Schrodinger W**k Award perhaps.
Does that mean the marriage is........ off???
*horrified face emoji*
You don't get out of it that easily .....
I'm rather enjoying this prolonged long-distance courtship, if that's the right word.
And I may need to make a sudden escape away from the HMRC's clutches and you seem ideally suited for that.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
It's since been proved by observation with the help of Quantum Entanglement. Quantum Mechanics doesn't care how ridiculous we think it is.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
The original United States was founded by individuals who were mainly fleeing religious persecution or, at least, a regime that they felt restricted their religious freedom. It's no wonder religion is at the heart of the States.
That is why the founding fathers put separation of Church and State at the heart of the bill of rights
Not quite.
The Puritans who went to the States were anti-Catholic and certainly would not have tolerated Catholics in their states, which is why Maryland was specifically set up to act as a refuge for persecuted Catholics. A lot of the underlying factor why the States went for the Church and State separation was that there was a natural disagreement over what religion would have been the state religion given the interests of Puritans / Episcopalians and (to a lesser degree in 1776) Catholics.
When you say "separation of Church and State," you need to account for the fact that the First Amendment says only that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," and that there were provision for tax-funded churches in Massaachusetts until 1833, Connecticut until 1818, New Hampshire until 1819, and Vermont until 1807.
Slavery was absolutely at the heart of the founding of the US, it is right there interwoven into its founding documents
the institution of slavery is only mentioned in the Constitution of the United States two or three times, and in neither of these cases does the word “slavery” or “negro race” occur; but covert language is used each time, and for a purpose full of significance... Language is used not suggesting that slavery existed or that the black race were among us. And I understand the contemporaneous history of those times to be that covert language was used with a purpose, and that purpose was that in our Constitution, which it was hoped and is still hoped will endure forever,—when it should be read by intelligent and patriotic men, after the institution of slavery had passed from among us,—there should be nothing on the face of the great charter of liberty suggesting that such a thing as negro slavery had ever existed among us. This is part of the evidence that the fathers of the Government expected and intended the institution of slavery to come to an end. They expected and intended that it should be in the course of ultimate extinction. And when I say that I desire to see the further spread of it arrested, I only say I desire to see that done which the fathers have first done. When I say I desire to see it placed where the public mind will rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, I only say I desire to see it placed where they placed it. -
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
It's since been proved by observation with the help of Quantum Entanglement. Quantum Mechanics doesn't care how ridiculous we think it is.
Why does quantum entanglement favour Copenhagen over the many worlds interpretation?
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
I hope the bulge in your underpants isn’t showing too much. Edit: updated for correct item of nethergarments.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
Reality is contingent upon observation, thus Schroedinger's cat.
Schrodinger's cat is a *counterargument* to that claim, described by him as "a ridiculous case."
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
It's since been proved by observation with the help of Quantum Entanglement. Quantum Mechanics doesn't care how ridiculous we think it is.
Why does quantum entanglement favour Copenhagen over the many worlds interpretation?
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
I hope the bulge in your speedos isn’t showing too much.
It won't be, the rumour is he's not well blessed in that region...
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
On the referendum the SC set out the position extremely clearly in a unanimous decision quite recently when the SG tried to incorporate a UN Convention on the rights of the Child which impinged on the rights reserved to the UK Parliament. This is the SC press release on the matter: https://www.supremecourt.uk/press-summary/uksc-2021-0079.html
It seemed to me that Lord Reed went well beyond what was necessary for the particular case to spell out the process in detail and the various safeguards built into the Scotland Act. Specifically in this case the first step is getting the Law Officers in Scotland to confirm that the bill is compatible; secondly the chair of the Parliament doing likewise (although failure to get this does not stop the bill outright) and thirdly the right to refer the Bill when passed to the SC for a ruling.
It remains to be seen if Sturgeon is able to short circuit this. It is entirely possible that the SC will decline to consider the bill until the other stages have been complied with. Even if they do they will follow the reasoning set out in the earlier case which makes it clear that Holyrood cannot pass legislation which impinges in any respect on reserved matters. This path is a dead end and Sturgeon must know it.
Her alternative of an election is much more complicated because in theory elections are about many things and are influenced by many factors. In a multiparty election nuances between parties can make the answer less than clear cut. Parties may want to take issue with the SNP's incompetence in building ferries, running schools and hospitals granting guarantees, and the disappointingly dry event that took place in the local brewery.
The idea of 'election as referendum' is nonsense of course. That is privately agreed by all. The idea that the SC will jump in to give the SG powers they didn't know they had is pretty fanciful, even if Lady Hale were still around.
The idea that Scots will vote a majority for, in due course, a hard border at Berwick and Gretna, pretending to be anti-nuclear while remaining in NATO (Scots have pride), losing the pound and the BoE, and losing English cash is nearly as fanciful.
So although the debate and discussion will be great, not least for the excellent and regular posts from the charming and insightful supporters of the SNP/the nationalist project here, the entire trompe l'oeil is a valiant and successful attempt to keep the Scottish political process in the hands of the SNP and a multitude of jobs for the boys, and girls, in Edinburgh and Westminster.
I'm not so sure - Sturgeon wants the referendum now because Bozo is, for her and the SNP, the perfect candidate to lead the Stay campaign.
Someone who 80% of the scottish population hates...
That's another interesting point. Will Labour front for Better Together 2 this time round? Will there even be an alliance of the Unionists with Mr Johnson around?
Given SLab's current bleat is that all this indy nonsense is distracting from the main task of getting rid of Boris and Wee Doogie Ross apparently (it's only Wednesday so this may change by Friday) thinks he should go, perhaps they can join together and form a Bettertogether without BJ campaign.
Though they're not noted for learning lessons north of Gretna, I would imagine that after their last indy ref experience Lab will remain at arms lenght from the Cons, BJ in charge or not. SKS will quack on about constitutional conventions and a mummified Brown will be wheeled around the country and revivified to do his thing.
I've obviously lost track - is that Mr Ross's 3rd u-turn on Mr J? Not being a very good Unionist, is he? And I'd clean forgot Brownzilla. It'll be like old times, rather like Diana Ross and Mick Jagger at Glasto, only not so pretty.
At least with the referendum taking place on 19th October, Broon will have time to go back to his crypt before halloween.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
When Mike created PB in 2003 I wonder if he ever thought 19 years later this would be the level of conversation...
We had an interesting discussion a few weeks ago that suggested that the early success of the Ukrainians with NATO equipment was evidence against increased defence spending.
So, suppose the SNP do plan on using the 2024 GE as a plebiscite for indy, if Boris and the Supreme Court say no... We get the following result: Labour - 283 Con - 275 SNP - 48 Lib Dems - 20 What does Starmer do? What does Sturgeon do?
Starmer forms a minority government with the LDs on those numbers and also ignores the SNP beyond a Brown commission on devomax
Report tonight Boris may allow indyref2 and to be honest it would be the right thing to do
No there isn't, anywhere. If he did then he would lose a VONC and be removed straight away
All the government said was "Our position remains unchanged that both ours and the Scottish Government's priority should be working together with a relentless focus on the issues that we know matter to people up and down the country.
"That remains our priority, but a decision has been taken by the First Minister, so we will carefully study the details of the proposal, and the Supreme Court will now consider whether to accept the Scottish Government's Lord Advocate referral".
I have just published that and you repeat it for some strange reason
Why are you so scared of a vote that is winnable
It is 50/50 at the moment and even if it was won the SNP would demand another referendum the UK government having been so weak as to allow an indyref2 before a generation had elapsed.
No, this Tory government must go full hardcore Madrid Catalonia 2017 if needed, no official indyref2 allowed under any circumstance whatsoever and Unionists to boycott any wildcat referendum
I am not convinced at your second paragraph. Telling the Scottish people (well any people for that matter) that they can't have something is most likely to make them want to double down against the denyers. People who don't want to vote indy could well end up doing so out of sheer bloody-mindedness.
On the other hand Johnson needs to be careful as the vote, whilst he remains PM, will be on a knife- edge. He could become the PM who both did Brexit, and did for the Union.
They can't if they have no vote. Madrid has successfully refused an official independence referendum for 5 years in Catalonia, indeed in 2017 it not only refused to recognise the Catalan independence referendum, it imposed temporary direct rule and the arrest was ordered of nationalist leaders for sedition, forcing many into exile.
Nothing must be off the table in order to take on the SNP
But it doesn't really work like that.
P*ss people off, particularly Scottish people, and they will punish you. Scottish Labour is your salutory lesson here.
As for your tanks on the Royal Mile, forget it, that will never happen.
No they won't. 71% of Scots don't want an indyref2 in 2023.
The UK government can and must stand up to Sturgeon, Westminster and Westminster alone has the final say on the Union and that is from the very legislation that set up Holyrood.
Scottish Labour was weak, the SNP must be dealt with with a rod of iron
We’re never far from HYUFD having a rod of iron when it comes to dealing with the SNP.
I've just passed a fleet of low loaders with tanks on the M4 heading eastbound from Castle Martin.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
First use of "bodacious" I have come across outside of Steely Dan. It doesn't mean what I thought it meant.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
First use of "bodacious" I have come across outside of Steely Dan. It doesn't mean what I thought it meant.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
I can't believe you admitted doing it. I'm now imaginings you now as Benny Hill.
(4/4) Would they actually reduce infections like that? What about: "I thought the vaccines don’t stop you getting Omicron. Or covid at all."
Have you seen the levels of infection and speed of rise? We’ve got an Rt of maybe 1.4. With a virus five to ten times as infectious as original strain covid (which was about 2.4 to 3.0). That means it “should” be somewhere in the 12-30 range. With exponential growth, multiplying by 12 every cycle rather than 1.4 means the ONS prevalence levels should go up within a couple of weeks until it’s a vertical line and the spreadsheet simply says “everyone.”
So, no, it doesn’t stop it dead. It’s not a suit of armour. But it does bounce off quite a bit. If it takes five attempts to get through, down from twenty, it’s reduced your infection level by a lot. People use the seatbelt analogy, and it’s a good one. Seat belts and airbags don’t stop you from dying in a car crash. But they reduce the rate a long way.
“But what about the cost and disruption of rolling them out?”
What disruption? It wouldn’t be the desperate “get jabs in arms NOW so we can release NPIs” of 2021. It’d be more like the winter flu jab regime.
And cost-wise: well you blow past the price of a jab within five minutes of presenting to hospital. And if it saves one day off work per year, you’ve more than made up the difference, haven’t you? Zero covid? Yeah, people still talk about that, but it’s not happening. It would need simultaneous eradication of covid worldwide, and we can’t do that with vaccines, so we’d need a worldwide lockdown at China levels with perfect adherence. No, that’s never happening. It’s here, we’re living with it; we merely have to select how we live with it.
Caution for the most vulnerable, regular boosters, reformulating for the latest strain (and here, the fact that covid seems to be stuck on the Omicron branch of the evolutionary tree is very helpful), HEPA filters, and possibly an increase in hospital capacity make the difference.
Andy - great set of posts. I agree almost totally, except that we really don't know the future. Some are suggesting we will be stuck in this loop forever, with as you say up to 4 bouts of covid each a year. I am not convinced by this. Its certainly true that omicron is great at evading pre-existing neutralising antibodies, but the vaccines and infections have hammered the potential for serious disease. At the moment covid has become stuck at omicron (variants of). Its possible, if not likely that a new variant will emerge in time that is from a different branch, or significantly different to warrant its own designation. But its also quite possible that two or three goes at omicron will lead to a much lower chance of future infections.
I, along with many others, have still not had covid (that I know of).
As to what we do - totally agree on air quality and its frankly a disgrace that government isn't doing a moonshot to do this in every hospital ward, care home and school classroom.
I also agree about treating people who choose to wear a mask with respect. You cannot know their reasons - they may well be clinically vulnerable but also wish to live their lives. It does cut both ways.
So - thanks for taking the time to lay that out.
Edit - Care home, not car home, which is of course a garage...
Andy is as informative as ever, but I'm going to take it further than @turbotubbs - it seems like potentially catastrophizing from the worst case scenarios for individuals, and from one current variant.
What I still don't understand is how many people seem to be dodging this. Unless my possible brush with Wuhan strain in December/Jan 2019/20 and triple Pfizer have conferred immense levels of immunity, it seems somewhat bizaare that I haven't ever had a confirmed case of Covid. I haven't worn a mask since the middle of last year, I have travelled all over Britain and Europe. I work in a shop. Most of my friends have kids and we spend time together. I have been to conferences with hundreds of people. I have had meals and boozy evenings with people who 24 hours later tested positive.
I don't know anyone who has had covid more than twice.
So where are the 4 times a year predictions coming from??
It appears that in an endemic state (including with waves), the number of times per year on average people get infected is approximately 52/(duration_infectiousness+duration_effective_immunity), where you measure these durations in weeks. duration_infectiousness is about 1 week. duration_effective_immunity can be inferred from the average prevalence level. Prevalence level with be given by (1-1/R0)/(1+ duration_effective_immunity / duration_infectiousness).
(Which means that when R0 is on the high side, it's almost irrelevant).
Which implies that at the below prevalences, the number of times infected on average will go:
2% - 1.1x 3% - 1.6x 4% - 2.2x 5% - 2.7x 6% - 3.3 x 7% - 3.9 x
Looking at the Omicron waves in England and in Scotland, it would imply that 2% and 7% are the extremes of where we'd expect the average endemic state to end up - as it stands at the moment.
And, of course, the average would have some wiggle around it. There are some, like you, me, and turbotubbs, who have escaped it so far when the average is over 1. There are some who have already had it three or four times. So if the average is around 2.2x (if average prevalence shakes out at 4%), a range of 1-4 would be about right.
I hope the average prevalence reduces, of course.
Although I am unqualified to make the following assumption, if a booster dose re-boosts immunity by exactly as much as an infection, then the effects of an annual booster dose available to the entire population would be to approximately halve the prevalence level and number of infections per year. A six-monthly booster dose would reduce it to about a third.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
Otoh laws against upskirting and revenge porn suggest the paddleboarder does not need to be aware of the chap with binoculars falling out of the tree in the forest.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
Oh I agree that anything involving principle or courage isn't BJ's thing. I was thinking more of the pure calculation, several months of remaining pm until Conservative mps find something resembling a spine, or 15 months crying God for Harry, England, and Saint George, with the chance of being the saviour of the UK at the end of it. That would add a nought to these supposed book deals and lecture tours that are going to keep BJ in the style to which he's become accustomed.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
Is this nearly over? Think I'd prefer some bug-eyed antiwoke ranting or some visceral scottophobia.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
I should think that the day I realised, like a bolt from the blue in a lecture room which Wittgenstein would have known, that the relationship between what there is and what we experience is fascinating and insoluble I was probably thinking about some girl at the same time. I can't remember the girl, but have never forgotten the electric thrill of realising that minds construct worlds. Et ego in Arcadia.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
I should think that the day I realised, like a bolt from the blue in a lecture room which Wittgenstein would have known, that the relationship between what there is and what we experience is fascinating and insoluble I was probably thinking about some girl at the same time. I can't remember the girl, but have never forgotten the electric thrill of realising that minds construct worlds. Et ego in Arcadia.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
You've misunderstood Schrodinger. The cat may be alive or dead, there's no way of knowing without observing, but if the box is still sealed and you can hear the cat meowing it is safe to infer that the cat is alive.
If someone random is in a room and we can observe no information about them, then they might or might not be a perv. If we know they're using a pair of binoculars . . . then the observation has been made.
The wave function has collapsed, we now have a single eigenstate, and a perv has been identified.
That is the same sort of logic you adopted when you claimed a year or two ago that Boris Johnson was the UK's greatest ever Prime Minister.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
Oh I agree that anything involving principle or courage isn't BJ's thing. I was thinking more of the pure calculation, several months of remaining pm until Conservative mps find something resembling a spine, or 15 months crying God for Harry, England, and Saint George, with the chance of being the saviour of the UK at the end of it. That would add a nought to these supposed book deals and lecture tours that are going to keep BJ in the style to which he's become accustomed.
More likely Boris would agree to the referendum, set a date just after the next election and then leave the mess for Labour to clear up. That way he could indulge in a year and a half of tub-thumping and wrapping himself in the flag without any danger of being PM when the UK breaks apart.
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
I’m using my binoculars to look at a beautiful young woman in a bikini on a paddleboard in Kotor Bay
There’s a moral conundrum. Does that count as perving? She will never know. No one else will know. Only I will ever know that I sleazily ogled her, and gained some pathetic middle aged pleasure out of it (me and thousands of people that read PB)
It’s like the whole “tree falling in empty forest” thing
The tree doesn’t normally admit it’s perving on the internet.
I’m doing SCHRODINGER’S PERVING
The perving only exists if it is observed by the perved, or by non-perving bystanders. And thanks to HEISENBERG’S PERVING PRINCIPLE, when the perving is observed the universe changes: ie by being observed in my perving, I will cease perving and have another pickled cornichon.
Ergo, there is no such thing as unobserved perving, and i can pick up by binos again
A perv is a perv even if they're not witnessed. If you're touching yourself while perving on other people, then you're a voyeuristic perv whether or not someone sees you using one of your hands to hold up your binos.
It’s tricky, philosophically
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
Is this nearly over? Think I'd prefer some bug-eyed antiwoke ranting or some visceral scottophobia.
It has neatly redirected the thread away from Trump and 1/6 and the upcoming Scottish referendum (and Brexiteer responsibilities thereof).
Incredible scenes with Andy Burnham addressing a council meeting in Oldham:
Charlotte Green - @CharGreenLDR Here’s a compilation of footage from the Oldham council meeting last night that captures the tone - one of rancour, anger, derision, and at times, pure venom towards leaders and the authorities
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
Oh I agree that anything involving principle or courage isn't BJ's thing. I was thinking more of the pure calculation, several months of remaining pm until Conservative mps find something resembling a spine, or 15 months crying God for Harry, England, and Saint George, with the chance of being the saviour of the UK at the end of it. That would add a nought to these supposed book deals and lecture tours that are going to keep BJ in the style to which he's become accustomed.
Yep. That's the honey trap. Let's send him some positivity. "Go on Bozzer. You know you want to."
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
Otoh laws against upskirting and revenge porn suggest the paddleboarder does not need to be aware of the chap with binoculars falling out of the tree in the forest.
The act of recording it is, presumably, what might turn it into an offence; or maybe if there is some gross violation of privacy?
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
I should think that the day I realised, like a bolt from the blue in a lecture room which Wittgenstein would have known, that the relationship between what there is and what we experience is fascinating and insoluble I was probably thinking about some girl at the same time. I can't remember the girl, but have never forgotten the electric thrill of realising that minds construct worlds. Et ego in Arcadia.
The world is all that is the case.
"Like Frege and Russell I construe a proposition as a function of the expressions contained within it" TL-P 3.318
I knew a guy who once had sex with an Australian woman who only agreed to it because she thought he too was Australian. He wasn't Australian but lied that he was. Is that tantamount to sexual abuse?
I knew a guy who once had sex with an Australian woman who only agreed to it because she thought he too was Australian. He wasn't Australian but lied that he was. Is that tantamount to sexual abuse?
If all sexual encounters containing any element of misrepresentation are abuse then our courts are going to be busy. With as many women as men in the dock.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
Otoh laws against upskirting and revenge porn suggest the paddleboarder does not need to be aware of the chap with binoculars falling out of the tree in the forest.
The act of recording it is, presumably, what might turn it into an offence; or maybe if there is some gross violation of privacy?
Neither of them applies here
Personally I think the use of binoculars crosses the line from harmless casual observation to perviness, if not legally then morally. I probably have a lower perviness threshold than you, though. Have a cold shower and read an improving book!
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
The line from Nippy yesterday is "Indy won't be like Brexit cos we won't fuck it up"
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
Otoh laws against upskirting and revenge porn suggest the paddleboarder does not need to be aware of the chap with binoculars falling out of the tree in the forest.
The act of recording it is, presumably, what might turn it into an offence; or maybe if there is some gross violation of privacy?
Neither of them applies here
Personally I think the use of binoculars crosses the line from harmless casual observation to perviness, if not legally then morally. I probably have a lower perviness threshold than you, though. Have a cold shower and read an improving book!
Perhaps when Leon saw that his binoculars were advertised as particularly suitable for bird watching he misunderstood.
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
Oh I agree that anything involving principle or courage isn't BJ's thing. I was thinking more of the pure calculation, several months of remaining pm until Conservative mps find something resembling a spine, or 15 months crying God for Harry, England, and Saint George, with the chance of being the saviour of the UK at the end of it. That would add a nought to these supposed book deals and lecture tours that are going to keep BJ in the style to which he's become accustomed.
More likely Boris would agree to the referendum, set a date just after the next election and then leave the mess for Labour to clear up. That way he could indulge in a year and a half of tub-thumping and wrapping himself in the flag without any danger of being PM when the UK breaks apart.
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
I don't think Johnson's thinking is quite so sophisticated. He wants another decade enjoying the wallpaper but that along with his legacy could be further scuppered by losing Scotland. Then again, he personally is the biggest incumberance to the continuation of the Union, so for the Union to survive he needs to resign...but then again, the wallpaper needs enjoying. Stuff the Union!
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
The line from Nippy yesterday is "Indy won't be like Brexit cos we won't fuck it up"
So what currency is she using, will she keep paying the pensions, and what will the border at Gretna look like?
It occurs to me that ‘allowing’ Indy ref II might solve a lot of Johnson’s short term problems (and when has the FLSOJ ever thought much beyond the short term). Unlike a GE he can say it has been forced on him, we are a country that respects democracy, more in regret than in anger etc. He can then indulge in his favourite activity of wrapping himself in the flag for 15 months and rally the UKIP lite party that is now the Cons: we must unite to resist the vile secessionists who seek to divide this great country. His politics thrives on divisiveness and what would be more divisive than a Engnat government squaring off with a Scotnat one? And of course there’s the big prize which PB Sc*tch experts insist is the most likely outcome, BJ could win it.
It would also put SKS and Lab in an exceedingly awkward position.
I mused that too. It wouldn't - assuming he wins - be such a terrible thing for him. Fact it could turn things around and cement his legend. Think not though because it would be a genuine and massive risk and he is not - contrary to lore - a risk taker in the sense of having courage. He does stupid crazy things, yes, but that's not the same. When you look closely at them you'll see it's when (he thinks) he has little to lose or when he's backed into a corner. Neither really applies here.
Oh I agree that anything involving principle or courage isn't BJ's thing. I was thinking more of the pure calculation, several months of remaining pm until Conservative mps find something resembling a spine, or 15 months crying God for Harry, England, and Saint George, with the chance of being the saviour of the UK at the end of it. That would add a nought to these supposed book deals and lecture tours that are going to keep BJ in the style to which he's become accustomed.
More likely Boris would agree to the referendum, set a date just after the next election and then leave the mess for Labour to clear up. That way he could indulge in a year and a half of tub-thumping and wrapping himself in the flag without any danger of being PM when the UK breaks apart.
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
I don't think Johnson's thinking is quite so sophisticated. He wants another decade enjoying the wallpaper but that along with his legacy could be further scuppered by losing Scotland. Then again, he personally is the biggest incumberance to the continuation of the Union, so for the Union to survive he needs to resign...but then again, the wallpaper needs enjoying. Stuff the Union!
On current polling, Boris has two years left and I do not expect things will get much better over the next 24 months...
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
The line from Nippy yesterday is "Indy won't be like Brexit cos we won't fuck it up"
Mr. Z, but so what? Ear drums are only needed to hear the sound. A sound unheard still exists.
There's a chair in my bedroom. I'm not in my bedroom right now. Photons aren't bouncing off the chair and smacking into my eyeballs. Yet the chair continues to exist. The chair's existence is not dependent upon my being there to view it. The principle is identical.
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
The problem I have italicised is discussed at length one way or another by almost every one of the great thinkers. Once you see it is a question it is impossible ever to unsee it. You are doomed.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
I'm glad that my admission that I was ogling some bodacious half-naked Slovenian nymph in Kotor has evolved into an an earnest discussion of Bishop Berkeley and "quantum entanglement". It is the alchemy of PB
Otoh laws against upskirting and revenge porn suggest the paddleboarder does not need to be aware of the chap with binoculars falling out of the tree in the forest.
The act of recording it is, presumably, what might turn it into an offence; or maybe if there is some gross violation of privacy?
Neither of them applies here
Fundamental difference between being seen (as opposed to stalked or harassed), even if you don't know it, when appearing in a public place, whatever you are wearing or not wearing and being upskirted in a public place or spied on in a private context.
To the female on the beach etc they would probably prefer to be admired by younger handsome muscular hunks, but, as they will discover, don't get to choose who admires the public display.
Comments
'God Isn't Real' - Robbie Fulks
Why should a tree falling be considered without sound unless there's an observer? That supposes reality is contingent upon observation, which just feels like the kind of arrogant self-centredness that led to people supposing the Earth was the centre of the universe, or mankind's activity's must and can only be the cause of a changing climate.
I don’t believe I am perving. And yet, if I now reached down my pants (sorry, I am sitting here in my pants on the balcony) and started to “have a strum” then that would cross some kind of moral line in my mind. And I would probably stop
And yet logically there is no difference. Both are me, unobserved and privately, taking pleasure in a beautiful young woman - paddleboarding about half a kilometre away
UNLESS, OF COURSE, SHE IS OUT THERE WITH HER SMARTPHONE, READING PB RIGHT NOW
That school ventilation is not the number 1 priority of every government at the moment is absurd.
The Romans had child brothels too, so I assume we are cool with those.
Dunno if a solitary leopard counts.
If someone random is in a room and we can observe no information about them, then they might or might not be a perv. If we know they're using a pair of binoculars . . . then the observation has been made.
The wave function has collapsed, we now have a single eigenstate, and a perv has been identified.
The Puritans who went to the States were anti-Catholic and certainly would not have tolerated Catholics in their states, which is why Maryland was specifically set up to act as a refuge for persecuted Catholics. A lot of the underlying factor why the States went for the Church and State separation was that there was a natural disagreement over what religion would have been the state religion given the interests of Puritans / Episcopalians and (to a lesser degree in 1776) Catholics.
* checks mortality rates ..... and Irish passport *
Nah, still not scared.
DNA though suggests that one of my maternal ancestors was Swedish!
*Might be hard to make the case for a paddleboarder being a spectacle to watch, but a couple of years back, I spent some time watching, with my then three year old, some kite surfers through binoculars, admiring what they were doing, which was quite spectacular - jumps many metres into the air. The was Beadnell bay so they were in full wetsuits and - I think - they were male. Safe to say there was no perving taking place.
Re the slaves in the American hemisphere, Irish rebels under Cromwell were sent to the West Indies to work in essentially slave-like conditions. It was when their supply dried up, that planters in Barbados turned more to the African slave trade.
What about projecting a mental image of a previously observed paddleboarder? Asking faf.
As I understand it the rate of mutation in mitochondrial DNA has been used as a clock to estimate the existence of an evolutionary bottleneck coincident with a very large volcanic eruption some trends of thousands of years ago.
Even more like when you are at home in your flat than we had imagined....
Just thinking back to the Stonehenge Exhibition at the British Museum: people buried at the henge came from Denmark and France and beyond, in their lifetimes
Then there's Otzi the prehistoric iceman. Descended from Corsicans, died crossing a mountain pass between modern Italy and Austria
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ötzi
The Schrodinger W**k Award perhaps.
They said the art was to make sure the guy was all done before they had finished undressing.
The many world interpretation of quantum events gets round the paradox, but is a bit worrying in other ways.
*horrified face emoji*
PS There's at least one case of the drover sending his dog home with coins tied up on its collar - it called in at the drovers' pubs and the innkeepers fed the hound all the way home, everyone knew each other so well ...
We already had the whole "Irish slaves in Barbados" argument, it is basically an alt-right meme with at best limited basis in fact. I used to live in Barbados BTW so am well versed in its unfortunately rather unpleasant history.
duration_infectiousness is about 1 week.
duration_effective_immunity can be inferred from the average prevalence level.
Prevalence level with be given by (1-1/R0)/(1+ duration_effective_immunity / duration_infectiousness).
(Which means that when R0 is on the high side, it's almost irrelevant).
Which implies that at the below prevalences, the number of times infected on average will go:
2% - 1.1x
3% - 1.6x
4% - 2.2x
5% - 2.7x
6% - 3.3 x
7% - 3.9 x
Looking at the Omicron waves in England and in Scotland, it would imply that 2% and 7% are the extremes of where we'd expect the average endemic state to end up - as it stands at the moment.
And, of course, the average would have some wiggle around it. There are some, like you, me, and turbotubbs, who have escaped it so far when the average is over 1. There are some who have already had it three or four times. So if the average is around 2.2x (if average prevalence shakes out at 4%), a range of 1-4 would be about right.
I hope the average prevalence reduces, of course.
I think it's fair to say that they're was a time in the past when visiting London would have been more exotic than visiting New York is today.
Edit: To Glenelg sorry. Forgot which side was which.
I'm rather enjoying this prolonged long-distance courtship, if that's the right word.
And I may need to make a sudden escape away from the HMRC's clutches and you seem ideally suited for that.
https://twitter.com/REWearmouth/status/1542086596144545793
Edit: updated for correct item of nethergarments.
Of these Kant is easily the greatest though incomprehensible (Bryan Magee is the best way in IMHO) and Bishop Berkeley both readable and very funny in a dry way. The dialogues of Hylas and Philonous are a great starting point. Berkeley's position is impossible, but try refuting it.
“I have gone from Trump is less than likely to be charged to he is more than likely to be charged.”
NY Times.
Operation Save the Union is underway!
And look where that got you!
Personally, I think the Scots would vote to Remain in the UK simply because they have the great example of the Brexit shambles to show them what it is like to burn bridges.
You have to admire masterful shepherding.
Charlotte Green - @CharGreenLDR
Here’s a compilation of footage from the Oldham council meeting last night that captures the tone - one of rancour, anger, derision, and at times, pure venom towards leaders and the authorities
https://twitter.com/CharGreenLDR/status/1541747312753577984
Neither of them applies here
There's a chair in my bedroom. I'm not in my bedroom right now. Photons aren't bouncing off the chair and smacking into my eyeballs. Yet the chair continues to exist. The chair's existence is not dependent upon my being there to view it. The principle is identical.
Impossibly romantic
To the female on the beach etc they would probably prefer to be admired by younger handsome muscular hunks, but, as they will discover, don't get to choose who admires the public display.