What's going on in the world

Now that I am back to semi-regular blogging, I wonder what has been going on in the world.

Worldwide, we learn that sometimes fear of a terrorist can produce more fatalities than the typical car-bomb. Grim gives a good story of seeing a similar event in his childhood.

During peacetime, something similar happened at a large social gathering in Calumet, Michigan. That time, someone shouted fire in a crowded building. Seventy-five fatalities occurred out of a gathering of hundreds of people. It is a classic example of the danger of inducing panic in an enclosed environment packed with people.

The power of a mob of people to keep all of its members from knowing exacly what is happening is a powerful inducement to panic. Especially when news travels by word of mouth, and imagination turns the unknown fear into certain danger. I would guess that this combination produces responses like the one seen in Baghdad this week more often than not.

My sympathies go out to all involved in that terrible event.

Storms

I've been away from computers for far too long...

One of the problems with beginning a new school year and taking up a project that keeps me busy every working hour of the first week--a project that is entirely outside of my normal school-work.

I've heard and seen a little bit about the latest iteration of the Big Bad Hurricane story. At least one person is wondering if the Gulf Coast might be in for another couple of decades of hard hurricane weather...

But I'm actually wondering if a storm of a different sort is working its way across my current situation. Last week, I took a pair of exams. For reasons related to the time I entered this particular grad school, and the policies of the Math Department I study in, this was my last chance to pass these exams and enter the PhD program. One test, the Abstract Algebra one, I nearly aced. The guy who graded it told me that I got all the main ideas right, and made a few minor arithmetic errors in attempting to solve one problem.

The other test, Linear Algebra, proved to be a monster I couldn't tame.

So, now I have exactly one semester more of support from the Department. The Grad Comittee won't support me past that point as a non-PhD student. I stand a good chance of walking away from the school with a Master's degree at that time, so it's no big loss.

But I have to decide what to do with myself by that time.

There is one program here at TechU that might accept me, but I don't know if I want to pursue it. On the other hand, I don't know if I want to move away. There are many things to love about living in a rural area, and I don't know if any job I can get at a research lab or industrial location will put me in a similar geographical setting.

My decisions affect which course I pursue. But a good deal depends on what is available, and I'm not sure what is available.

I think it is rather clear to me that I want to continue as a researcher. Not that there is much else for an MS in discrete mathematics to do...but having done a little research, I know that I could continue to do it for a long time to come. And enjoy myself thoroughly along the way.

Survival

Having survived two challenging 3-hour exams in the past 4 days, I'll sit back and wonder at that strange combination of numbers.

I will express some surprise: Linear Algebra was hard, Abstract Algebra was easy. Most students, I'm told, express the opposite when confronted with the two subjects.

I'll not attempt to reconstruct the number of hours I spent studying during the past two weeks.

At any rate, I am free from schoolwork for the time being, but I still have to prepare for my work as a TA, which begins in earnest next week.

Life goes on...and hopefully, I passed the exams and can continue past the Master's level here at Tech.

Falling into a singularity

Even as I write this post title, I am trying to decide if I am referring to the singularity of a black hole, or a matrix that has a determinant of zero...

I have spent the last 5 days doing two things: volunteer work helping freshman move into dorms at the University, and doing practice problems for Proficiency Exams.

The Proficiency Exams are a monster that every prospective Doctoral student (in Mathematics, here at Tech U.) must assault. Some fail--I did once, when I was a neophyte graduate student.

Now I rise to the challenge again. One phase will be Linear Algebra, the other will be Abstract Algebra.

In the period of rest between now and the first phase tomorrow, I sit and wonder if I have prepared enough.

Then I wonder what I'll do with my spare time once I'm done with these tests. But by that time, I will be beginning the regular school year...

Say What?

So, it seems that the hapless recipient of a gunshot wounds to the head in the London subways last month wasn't as suspicious-looking as news reports originally said.

On the other hand, I'm still a bit leary of this data: it comes unnamed sources leaking privileged data. Still, it is worth combing over the details involved in the death of Charles de Menezes.

A report by the Times (hat tip: Kim duToit) gives the details of the police activity that day, and leads me to believe that many of the details reported by bystanders were greatly exaggerated.

For example, the "heavy winter coat" seen by bystanders looked more like a "light denim jacket" on videotape. (Wouldn't the officers have photos of the scene and evidence-bags full of clothes to help clarify this detail? Why does it depend on CCTV evidence?)

The witness who remembered seeing wires coming out from under Menezes' jacket must have been imagining things.

The witness who reported Menezes vaulting the ticket-turnstiles must have imagined stuff, too--because the man used a swipe-card to go through the ticket-turnstile. He apparently did not break into a run until it appeared that he might be missing the train.

Mr. Menezes apparently left a building that was being watched. But the man who was supposed to watch the building was busy in the water-closet, and wasn't able to tell if the man who left the building was his target (a suspected terrorist named Hussain Osman).

He passed on advice to have his fellow policement ID the guy, or at least take pictures...but no one did.

The situation was handed off to a firearms team that had photos of suspects. No information is available on whether they were told that their list of photos were their only targets, or a subset of their targets. Whichever was the case, they apparently had little time (or inclination) to double-check the Menezes' face against their photo-list.

There also appears to have been coordination problems--not everyone was sure when the shooting would start, and when it could be determined that lethal force was the only option. To illustrate: one officer was tackling Menezes, when another began shooting. The shooting apparently surprised the first officer, who felt he had the situation in hand.

It looks my first instinct was right: this event is an application of the GIGO principle to police operations.

Watchdogs (Updated)

A properly-trained watchdog is a good thing. At least, it is a good thing for a house or building which has any need for protection from theft, vandalism, or arson.

If such a criminal came by to perpetrate his dirty work, he would be unable to escape detection. A watchdog's nose can track the smell of a human being from great distances. His hearing can pick up stuff our ears miss, both in terms of frequency and sensitivity. A watchdog can be trained to bark (alerting both criminal and any watchman on the premises) or attack the criminal (driving him away or killing him).

Nations often employ people to act in a watchdog-like role. In this case, they are less worried about crime and more worried about various war-like acts, both overt and covert.

The United States, for example, has a network of agencies to monitor the communications of enemies (NSA), watch their military activities (DIA), watch their political system and decision-making process (CIA) and investigate possible foreign agents in the States (FBI).

What do we conclude, then, when we hear that someone in authority has muzzled the watchdog? What about when evidence comes out that someone ignored a distant watchdog a decade ago, when that watchdog was warning about someone who has since then attacked Americans on American soil?

Something is seriously wrong with a national government that tries to ignore its watchdogs. Or kept one particular watchdog from being noticed by most of the attending watch-men.

I am also surprised at the news that a government commission that was tasked with finding out how the watchdog failed at his job, apparently tried to ignore the muzzling of the dog.

At any rate, we as a nation need to know how and why this occurred. More importantly, we need to make sure that our watchdogs have been unmuzzled.

UPDATE: neo-neocon has a much better article about the why behind my questions. She also links to a much longer and more complete exploration by Andrew C. McCarthy.

Interesting News Story

During a phone conversation with my parents, I learned something interesting.

Apparently, a major newspaper from their area does a yearly story about home-schooling. This year's edition of the story is found here.

I am interested in this because my parents home-schooled me during most of my primary and all of my secondary education. I can remember when home-schooling was unheard-of. I can remember when the State Legislature wrote home-schooling into state law. I can remember wondering if I would have to explain home-schooling to a college admissions-officer. And I can remember being very happy when they cared more about my transcript and SAT/ACT scores than about my diploma.

I also liked getting four years of full-tuition scholarship at the first University I attended.

The author of the article is generally fair towards home-schoolers, but apparently worries much about whether or not the home-school parents should be monitored.

From my perspective, this appears absurd. What kind of parents would home-educate their children? The kind of parents who care very deeply about what kind of education their children get.

Do these parents have all the pre-requisites for good teaching? Maybe, maybe not. But usually, they have at least graduated high-school themselves, and can find resources from such diverse locations as the local library, on-line book catalogs, and other home-schooling parents.

Most of the home-schooled children I knew were intelligent in the most important way: they knew how to think for themselves, and do research on their own. That, by itself, will give them the ability to do well in the world.

A weekend off

Without realizing it, I took the weekend off of blogging.

The weekend produced some interesting events. Last Friday was the end of the summer term here at Tech U. (I have been taking a self-directed, study-as-you-go course for the second half of the term, beginning in July. I was also freed from the drudgery of grading homework for another instructor at about that time.)

The house I am currently renting a room in is mostly empty. However, 10 students will be moving into the house over the next two weeks. Hence, one of my house-mates decided to go on a cleaning frenzy, to prepare the house for moving in.

During the cleaning frenzy, someone mentioned that we were doing the work that house-maids had done in houses like this for years. I reflected, and realized that this particular house must have had a succession of maids working in it during its heyday.

The part of town that we live in is directly adjacent to the University. It also used to be the upper-class part of the neighborhood, from the days when copper mining brought large amounts of money into the area. The house in question has many of the trappings of wealth in its finishings. An ornately-carved mantel for a fireplace and an elegant stairwell that is encased in stained-glass windows are two examples. A large living-room, and 4 large bedrooms on the second floor all give some idea what life was like in the house during the Roaring Twenties. A third floor built out of an expanded attic is much more prosaic by comparison, and has finish-work from the Baby-Boom era.

At any rate, I gained some experience in caring for such an old house. And I learned a little more about the history of this part of the state of Michigan. During the past 150 years, this part of the state went from wilderness to a rich copper-mining region to a tourist-centered region. The Technological University and the old mine-shafts are the most visible results of a century of copper-mining.

The house I live in is another reminder.

Links about history

I'm a latecomer to this party--there has been lots of commentary in certain parts of the WWW about the events on the 6th of August, 1945. The followup on 9th of August was the final straw, leading to the celebration that was known as "V-J day".

Since then, atomic weapons have not been used in any war.

I don't feel much need to say very much, compared to what has been said by men like Donald Sensing. He posted a second article about contemporary commentary on the bomb use.

Baldilocks has also posted on the event, and she links to a blogger whose dad guarded one of the bombs en route to the air base at Tinian. She also links to an interesting pair of photos.

Book Review: injustice and revenge

While I'm mulling over some of the news I've seen recently, I'll recap a surprisingly delightful re-read of a classic.

Title: The Count of Monte-Cristo

Plot Elements: maritime commerce, secret messages, false accusations, wrongful imprisonment, long-lost treasure, reward of old friends, revenge on old enemies, infamous deeds, old secrets, madness, long-lost loves, new love, and the unseen justice of God.

Characters: plenty of them. An innocent young man becomes wise in the ways of the world. Among those he knows are an honest merchmantman, a beautiful woman, a scheming soldier, a greedy banker, a double-dealing prosecutor, and a highly-educated Italian priest. Most of these characters have sons or daughters who appear later in the story. Every such child who appears ends up playing a role in the denouement of the conflict. Each of these children reflects something on their family background, position at birth, and the character of their parents in the way they live out their lives.

Re-read value: high. Alexandre Dumas' writing is the kind of writing that draws the reader into his world. Each character is strongly drawn. Everyone encounters surprises, and each one reveals their character by their response.

I also note that there are several English-language versions of the novel available. It is a long story, and the unabridged version that I read was engrossing. Each scene takes some time to read, but the overall story moves on with a relentless focus.

Thoughts about the story: Edmond Dantes lives in a world in which human justice is limited. He also lives in a world in which everyone has at least a tacit belief in God. For that reason, Dantes chooses a path in life in which he sees himself as an agent of God in the present world. By the end of the story, he has realized his limits as a human being, and apparently admits that performing the justice of God in this world is beyond human power. He is eventually humbled by an unexpected love, and decides to leave his life of influence and wealth behind.

New Information about London attacks

It's now been a month since the first Islamist terrorists set off bombs in the subways of London.

Today, the erudite blogger known as neo-neocon points to a news report about the events.

The news report details how second-generation immigrants in England and Euope are providing rich fodder for terror recruitment. Apparently, the children of Muslim parents who have moved into England find themselves marginalized in a foreign society. They also find that the dreamed-of wealth of living in the West falls short of expectations. And, as Doc Russia noted, the ones who became terror operatives had to have found some social structure which supported and praised that goal.

The article also details how the global Al-Qaeda organization has gone through a significant change. The organization that attacked the Twin Towers had a definitive global structure, a hierarchical leadership circle centered aroung Osama bin-Laden, the nation of Afghanistan as a home-port and training area, and financial/logistical support for moving attackers into the US from around the world. The Al-Qaeda organization of today consists of loosely-connected affiliates, each with its own leader, local operatives, and goals. There is no apparent hierarchy of authority. They have a harder time coordinating international logistics and funding. They also have a harder time planning big-scale attacks.

After several years of warfare against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, and a related war against terrorist-friendly Iraq, it appears that success of a kind has occurred.

The success is real, but limited. Those who still have ideology in common with Osama bin-Laden and Al-Qaeda still gather together in terrorist cells, and plan assaults. They don't have a big umbrella organization to work with anymore, but they still have the Islamist ideology. They also have the ability to recruit people willing to commit suicide for The Cause.

It remains an open question if America's dealings with immigrants will make it harder for the terrorist cells to form on American soil than in English soil.

Fanaticism

One of the recurring memes in discussions about the Global War on Terror is the following syllogism:

• Osama bin-Laden, the Taliban, Al-Qaeda and company are Islamist fanatics. Their behavior includes subjugating women, driving airplanes into the Twin Towers, blowing up subways, and the like.
• Islam is a religion.
• Therefore, Christian (or Buddhist, Hindu, etc.) fanatics are equally evil.

I have generally ignored such arguments, or shrugged them off in my mind. I disagree with the conclusion of the syllogism, but didn't really take the time to pull apart its supporting assumptions.

These thoughts were hiding in a dormant part of my subconscious yesterday while I was browsing through some essays. These essays were digital re-publications of works published by G.K. Chesterton in the early 20th Century.

The essay that brought these thoughts out into my consciousness was an essay on Leo Tolstoy. Chesterton, who wrote when Tolstoy was still alive, starts his essay with a short, apparently-pointless comparison of Tolstoy to the Doukhabors, a renegade band of anarchists in Canada. Apparently, these anarchists were the ideological cousins of the modern People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

IF any one wishes to form the fullest estimate of the real character and influence of the great man [Tolstoy] whose name is prefixed to these remarks, he will not find it in his novels, splendid as they are, or in his ethical views, clearly and finely as they are conceived and expanded. He will find it best expressed in the news that has recently come from Canada, that a sect of Russian Christian anarchists has turned all its animals loose, on the ground that it is immoral to possess them or control them....
This great act of heroic consistency which has taken place in Canada is the best example of the work of Tolstoy. It is true (as I believe) that the Doukhabors have an origin quite independent of the great Russian moralist, but there can surely be little doubt that their emergence into importance and the growth and mental distinction of their sect, is due to his admirable summary and justification of their scheme of ethics.

Chesterton expounds at length on the ways in which this similarity helps him understand Tolstoy.

At any rate, the passage which opened my eyes was this one:

This emergence of Tolstoy, with his awful and simple ethics, is important in more ways than one. Among other things it is a very interesting commentary on an attitude which has been taken up for the matter of half a century by all the avowed opponents of religion. The secularist and the sceptic have denounced Christianity first and foremost, because of its encouragement of fanaticism; because religious excitement led men to burn their neighbours and to dance naked down the street.

Here Chesterton's words echo the modern moralists. Religion is suspect because it makes men kill innocent--from children in a school in Beslan to Irish Protestants in Dublin, from American soldiers on the USS Cole to American businessmen in New York.

But neither I nor Chesterton think religion is the only causing force at work.

How queer it all sounds now. Religion can be swept out of the matter altogether, and still there are philosophical and ethical theories which can produce fanaticism enough to fill the world.

Is it really true that fanatics (or extremists) are not the sole province of religion?

...if any one doubts this proposition--that fanaticism has nothing to do with religion, but has only to do with human nature--let him take this case of Tolstoy and the Doukhabors. A sect of men start with no theology at all, but with the simple doctrine that we ought to love our neighbour and use no force against him, and they end in thinking it wicked to carry a leather handbag, or to ride in a cart.

Tolstoy's thoughts find the following conclusion:

A great modern writer who erases theology altogether, denies the validity of the Scriptures and the Churches alike, forms a purely ethical theory that love should be the instrument of reform, and ends by maintaining that we have no right to strike a man if he is torturing a child before our eyes...[H]e develops a theory of the mind and the emotions, which might be held by the most rigid atheist, and he ends by maintaining that the sexual relation out of which all humanity has come, is not only not moral, but is positively not natural.

Chesterton concludes his remarks about fanaticism and religion by saying this:

This is fanaticism as it has been and as it will always be. Destroy the last copy of he Bible, and persecution and insane orgies will be founded on Mr. Herbert Spencer's "Synthetic Philosophy."

At which point I was reminded not only of the PETA, but of the atheists who are distressed at the sight of a cross in a memorial structure in San Diego. Both groups of people exhibit fanaticism in one form or another, and neither are particularly religious. And I am also reminded of other Russian fanatics like Vladimir Lenin. He was no friend of religion, unless a person defines Marxism as a religion.

However, there are fanatics and there are fanatics. One kind makes a lot of noise, lobbies legislators, files suit in court, pickets objectionable institutions and businesses, etc. The other kind carries bags of explosives onto subways, uses box-cutters as weapons to hijack airplanes, advocates violent overthrow of governments, etc.

Which brings me back to the syllogism mentioned above. The bad part of religious fanaticism is the fanatical part--not the religious part. What kind of fanatics are they? Do they want to change people by force, or convince them by argument?

Good Story

Just got back from a 5-day weekend of camping, swimming, bicycling, and long talks around campfires...

So when I look up the blogs that I've missed over the weekend, I found lots of interesting stuff had happened while I was gone. The story that stuck out in my mind as worth mentioning was found over on Gun Watch. Three stories were in that listing, and one was of a failed attempt at rape/sexual assault in Arkansas.

Picture this: A man attempts to disrobe and beat a teenaged girl. The newspaper record is a little hazy on where this began, but the girl runs to a closet in the corner of the house. Obviously, the event began on or near her home.

Anyway, the 48-year-old man chases the teenager, finding her in the closet. He resumes attempts at beating her.

She escapes from his grasp, manages to grab a 9mm rifle which was nearby, and shot him.

The newspaper carefully does not mention whether the gun had any kind of safety lock on it--though I suspect it did not. I also wonder if there was a live round in the gun-chamber, or if a loaded magazine was inserted. Or if the girl had to load the magazine, then insert it into the rifle.

Somehow, I doubt that the magazine was unloaded, and I doubt that it was separate from the rifle.

At any rate, the news story continues with the would-be rapist receiving a shot in the leg. No needles involved with this shot--just a rifle, a bullet, and a scared teenage girl. (Note to the ladies in my audience: aim for the Center of Mass, and you'll always stop the Bad Guy. Bad Guys aren't always crippled by a shot in the leg.)

The news story concludes with the girl running for help. Apparently, the jurisdiction was handled by a county Sheriff. That, and the way the location is described, make me think that the girl was in a house in the rural parts of the county. After a little Q&A session, the girl was released to her parents.

This is the kind of crime-stopping story that I like to see. We have a teenaged girl (usually pretty defenseless against older, stronger men) asserting her right not to be molested/raped. She uses a firearm to do so, and a firearm which didn't have most of the "usual" safety precautions in place. That rifle was apparently little danger to the law-abiding and sensible members of the household, but was very dangerous for the aforementioned assailant.

I have known, in my lifetime, at least one woman who has been touched by fear of assault. I never troubled myself to ask her why. She was the kind who deliberately kept a large tire-iron in the car to ward off scary-looking assailants. She didn't always talk about possible assaults, but a discerning person could tell that such threats were always present in her subconscious. This behavior was in the small details--avoiding situations where she would be alone is a simple example.

Such women could learn much from this story. A firearm in a purse is more powerful than a tire-iron in the back seat of the car. Weekly practice at the range does more for your personal safety than a lifetime of avoiding trouble-spots. Hanging around honorable men increases your safety; hanging around honorable men who keep weapons ready for trouble increases your safety tremendously.