The largest land animal ever might have been found. Yes, it's a fossil dinosaur from Argentina...
My nerdish side actually finds this fascinating.
Dinosaur fossils found in Argentina. Could be of the largest animal that lived on Earth
Sunday, January 31, 2021
The crown of creation, er, evolution
Hunting the thylacine
Or rather modeling. I have no idea how they did it, or whether there's something to it, but these researchers claim that the thylacine (a predatory marsupial believed to be extinct since the 1930's) might have been alive in Tasmania until very recently.
It's always fun when main-stream science takes cryptozoology seriously.
Dog-like predator with kangaroo pouch believed extinct since 1930's possibly lived till 2000s
Saturday, January 30, 2021
Some thoughts on the Reformation
For quite some time, I defended the idea that the Protestant Reformation was "objectively historically progressive" and a "precursor to the bourgeois revolution". But is this really correct?
One problem with the idea of something being "objectively progressive" is that this can be known only with centuries of hindsight. In other words: it can't be known. This is no problem for Marxism, which has borrowed the idea of a teleological "cunning of reason" (or history) from Hegel (really a pantheistic version of Divine providence). And of course Marx claimed to live during a time when the future finally *could* be divined by looking at the present, thus "knowing" that socialism would be the next stage in human development. Except, of course, that he couldn't.
If the Hegelian-Marxist perspective is rejected, how can we *then* talk about something being "objectively historically progressive"? It can only be based on observing the past and the present, not by trying to divine some mysterious "laws" or providence in (future) history.
What actually happened during the Reformation? The most obvious thing was that the kings no longer accepted any authority higher than themselves (such as the papacy) and strenghthened the central state power. Royal power became absolutist, and the state tightly controlled both politics and the economy. The nobility or aristocracy was the dominant class in society.
Put this way, the Reformation suddenly doesn't feel so radical anymore, does it?
Note also that *exactly the same processes* were at work in the Catholic nations, most notably France. Other similarities between Protestant and Catholic nations are equally glaring, such as colonialism, the trans-atlantic slave trade, and the settling of the Americas after the demographic collapse there.
Presumably, this was also "objectively historically progressive". Or nah?
Both Protestant and Catholic nations could be extremely intolerant of religious dissent. There were also exceptions - on both sides. Protestant Holland and England were (sometimes) tolerant, but so were Poland and Rudolf II's famous court at Prague. James II was technically more tolerant than William of Orange! Nor was there any particular difference in scientific or technical developments, despite the meddling of the Inquisition.
I suppose you could argue that the few "democracies" during this period were Protestant. However, pre-20th century democracy was very relative. That Catholicism is compatible with such democracy is proven by the Middle Ages. Spain had the first parliament. And what about the Italian city-states?
It's true that the most radical currents during the Reformation were Protestant, but they were condemned by the moderate reformers. Luther's attack on the German peasant uprising is notorious. Also, the radicals were frequently inspired by mysticism and occultism, making me wonder how "Protestant" they really were? It's also ironic to note that the most succesful peasant revolt in Sweden, the Dacke War, was Catholic!
What exactly *was* the Protestant Reformation? Was it really a geopolitical struggle between northern and southern Europe? Or had it something to do with culture? Isn't it strange that Protestantism was strongest in the Germanic lands, while all Romance nations (except Romania) remained mostly Catholic? Note also the strangely anomalous position of France with its Gallicanism, Machiavellian alliances with Protestant nations, etc.
Perhaps the Reformation was really a revival of the Germanic spirit during a period marked by famine, pestilence, depopulation and the Little Ice Age. Not to mention international competition for those objective progressive slave-markets. Since it did shake the system, popular rebellions for a while dressed up as Protestant.
Until they didn't. And the world moved on...
Friday, January 29, 2021
Only available in Slovak
This is probably the most obscure book I will ever review here on my blog.
"Slovenske Mestske a Obecne Erby" is a book by Jozef Novak, published in 1967 in Bratislava by Slovenska Archivna Sprava. It was the first volume in a series called "Edicia Pomocne Vedy Historicke a Archivnictvo".
Yes, folks, we're talking about a book published in Communist Czechoslovakia.
The book deals with heraldry, more specifically the coats of arms of Slovak towns and villages. It's written in a relatively accesible style (at least if Slovak is your first language), but the author is obviously a scholar. The notes abound with references to archival sources, including medieval documents, seals and earlier works on Slovak heraldry. Or rather Hungarian ditto, since Slovakia was an integrated part of the Hungarian Kingdom until 1918.
The author explains the evolution of Hungarian heraldry in some detail. Originally, Hungarian towns used coats of arms based on those of the ruling dynasty (the House of Arpad). Later, this became impossible due to frequent dynastic conflicts and the rise of powerful local rulers. To feign neutrality, the towns therefore preferred to show patron saints on their coats of arms. A third phase saw the emergence of distinct town symbols, beholden neither to the ruling house nor the Church, reflecting the increased power and confidence of the towns during the Early Modern Period.
Apparently, the coat of arms of Banska Stiavnica is unique in Slovakian history, since it adopted a distinct town symbol already during the 13th century, no doubt because of its immense economic importance (silver mining).
During the 19th century, coats of arms were seen as antiquated and "feudal", and the local governments often stopped using them altogether. Those who continued using them often didn't know what coat of arms was the right one!
An administrative reform in 1902 tried to remedy the situation, even decreeing that all town seals in Hungary should be remade by the same person, Ignac Felsenfeld. A special commission studied relevant archival material to decide on the "right" emblems. As a heraldry nerd, Jozef Novak naturally believes that the earliest coats of arms are more "pure" than later ones, while the commission rather preferred the latest designs, since towns during earlier periods often used strikingly similar symbols.
Since the colors of many coats of arms were unknown (probably because they were only used as symbols on wax seals), the commission decided what colors to use, showing a strong preference for silver charges on blue shields, making Hungarian heraldry look weirdly uniform.
The book doesn't deal with developments under Communism, when many Slovak towns and localities unofficially kept their coats of arms - or changed them in very unheraldic ways (although it's possible this didn't happen until after the book was published).
I happen to know that many Slovak towns use the "wrong" coats of arms, compared to the ones Novak has unearthed from the archives. Often, the devil is in the details, as when Pezinok's coat of arms shows Mary on a green shield, when the actual motif should be Anna holding an infant Mary on a blue shield...
Or perhaps not, since the Catholics insist that the lady on the escutcheon *is* the Virgin Mary, while the Lutherans apparently interpreted her as Anna! This per the current website of Pezinok.
The color is still wrong, though.
Perhaps it's time for another commission?
Veckans anti-Strasser
Eller "varför jag är hjärtlöst trött på trottar".
David Norths Socialist Equality Party (tidigare Workers League) är irriterade på Jimmy Dore, en vänsterradikal kommentator på nätet. Han är tydligen alltför strasseritisk, eller nåt sånt.
På engelska.
Wtf, I love Macron now (part 65)
Well, French president Macron isn't *entirely* wrong here, although it's hard to take him seriously since his speech was delivered at a "Davos Virtual Forum", rather than before a huge crowd of sans-culottes armed with torches and pitch-forks.
And yes, the free market orthodoxy of whoever wrote the article is simply annoying...
An upper class cult?
It seems "identity politics" really is an upper class cult. Time to replace the dominant minority with a creative one?
From the New York Post.
Manhattan's most privileged kids play victim
Thursday, January 28, 2021
Veckans Strasser
Lite oväntat att Oisin Cantwell dyker upp i "Veckans Strasser", but here we go...
Från Aftonbladet.
Skit i konsekvenserna
En svidande kritik av den svenska skolan och flumpedagogiken. Tar sin avstamp redan på 1940-talet.
Långläsning i tre delar.
När de sociala ingenjörerna tog makten över skolan
Skolideologer som hatar skolan
Skolpolitikerna struntade i larmrapporterna
En riktig toppensnäcka
Först en skalbagge, och nu en snäcka. Jag är avundsjuk. Kan inte någon uppkalla en slemsvamp efter Ashtar Command? 😃
Från Aftonbladet.
Ny art av snäcka uppkallad efter Greta Thunberg
Wednesday, January 27, 2021
Gaming the system
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I don't *entirely* understand this article, but it seems some young Internet trolls have manipulated the US stock exchange!
They simply used the tactics of the established stock brokers and speculators against them. The whole thing seems completely irrational (a bit like that old Dutch tulip craze?), but somehow that's the point. The trolls, who are presumably libertarian, have managed to demonstrate the batshit crazy nature of capitalism...
The irony.
Some random thoughts on Gnosticism etc
Here are some random thoughts on certain topics.
Gnosticism is strictly dualist. The material world was created by an incompetent, imperfect or even evil force, "the Demiurge". The souls of men are held in thrall by demonic beings, the Archonts. Matter is evil. The goal is therefore to liberate the soul (or spirit) from this darkness and return home to the divine world of light. God is fundamentally alien to this world.
Neo-Platonism holds that the world is imperfect compared to God, but not really evil. The material world is the result of a "ray" or emanation from God, and is therefore a product of divine activity. The goal is still to leave the material world and ascend to the greater perfection above. However, since Neo-Platonism also believes in divine providence, nothing hinders the sage from remaining in the world, perhaps to help others reach the highest goal, or even to preach lesser goals in such a way that at least a modicum of providentially decreed "worldly" perfection is attained.
Hermetism is based on the metaphysics of Neo-Platonism, but strives to make the individual perfect in this life through magical practice. The quest for physical immortality through the use of magical elixirs belong here.
These are (of course) ideal types, and in practice, there is considerable overlap.
"Traditional" Christianity is obviously compatible with Neo-Platonism. It also has a "Hermetic" trait (the resurrection of the body) but only through miraculous intervention at the end of days.
Many Gnostics claimed to be Christian, but parallels to Buddhism and Hinduism are perhaps more obvious.
Hermetism is "occult" but also compatible with early modern science. Think alchemy and the like.
Personally, I find Gnosticism to be the most *existentially* convincing world-view. Is it really so hard to believe that this world is the work of the Devil? However, Gnosticism seems to be *philosophically* problematic.
How can the divine spirits be trapped in matter if there is an absolute dualism between spirit and matter? How could the Demiurge fall from the spiritual to the material if there is an absolute dualism? How could the Gnostic Christ enter the material world and communicate his message if there is such a dualism? This all suggests that there is *some* kind of connection between God and the material world. In other words, something more akin to Neo-Platonism.
At the same time, I find it hard to believe in providence. What could this providence even be? Unless it's something very broad, along the likes of "eventually, all monads will reach a state of self-reflective awareness and hence be able to see God". Well, thank you.
Perhaps the truth is somewhere in between Gnosticism and Neo-Platonism?
Hermetism is bunk. Where are all these physically immortal supermen who imbued the quicksilver elixir? Haven't seen them around lately...
It struck me that Theosophy seems to combine Gnosticism, Neo-Platonism and evolution. Anthroposophy combines Neo-Platonism, Hermetism and evolution.
End of stray reflections.
Kommunister för frihandel?
En intressant artikel om de geopolitiska intrigerna i Asien och Stilla Havs-området.
Översatt av Flammans redaktion.
Tuesday, January 26, 2021
Is there life on Earth?
I'm sure this is completely normal...
Although I'm not a science geek (no, really), I admit a certain fascination with this kind of stuff, perhaps because I un-scientifically assume that this somehow proves that *everything* is ALIVE.
Nanobes: Alien life forms from Mars?!
Det sista gränslandet?
Den här typen av märkliga nyheter gör mig mer optimistisk...
"Björndjur" kan tydligen överleva i yttre rymden. Åtminstone nästan...
"Panspermia", någon?
Basic bitch
These predictions are basic bitch, but I decided to write them down "for the record".
The United States won't experience "unity" under Biden or Harris, but a deepening crisis accompanied by increased polarization and fragmentation. A "Russia under Yeltsin" scenario?
Both right-wing populism, left populism and leftism will become stronger in the US, but perhaps not strong enough to unseat or influence the uni-party.
Liberalism will become more authoritarian (including censorship) in order to stop the system from imploding. There will be a trend towards increased state power in all nations, including state control over sectors of the economy. However, there will also be a tendency towards more corporate power. The relationship between the state and the corporations will look different at different times. Both the super-rich and various opposition factions will be very interested in capturing the state apparatus.
In some nations, the governments will implement UBI in an attempt to keep the population contended and passive. In others, they won't even try. The state will be used to herd the unemployed into working for the super-rich oligarchs. "Neo-feudalism"?
There will be huge conflicts over immigration in Europe.
Electrification, solar and wind ("Green energy") will be used as a cover for austerity. This will lead to the rise of "fossil fuel populism" or "fossil fuel & nuclear power populism" in the working class and the lower middle class.
The US is a great power in decline. China and Russia are ascendant. Since the US still has nuclear weapons and a large military, it can still count on support from smaller anti-Russian and/or anti-Chinese nations. However, some kind of failed state collapse of the US can't be completely ruled out, and neither can a military defeat. If so, Russia might invade the Ukraine, Belarus and Georgia, China will take Taiwan, and the Muslim nations might dare an attack on Israel. The results in Latin America of a steep US decline will be spectacular.
Terrorism will increase.
New pandemics will make the rich richer, the poor poorer, and the state more powerful. In a "worst case scenario", we might see mass deaths due to pandemics and famine.
SJWs will double down.
There will be more environmental destruction and adverse effects of climate change, but not a literal apocalypse.
Apocalyptic and millennarian movements will become more common, often in a "secular" garb.
The media will somehow blame everything on Trump and QAnon. They will continue sperging about Kamala Harris' fashion wear.
By a sheer strike of luck, this blog will still be around in 2030, saying "I told you so".
And no, there won't be no UFO disclosure!
"Fler övergrepp mot barn efter lockdowns"
Artikel om en skrämmande trend i coronapandemins spår.
Från Aftonbladet.
Yes, it's a monarchy
More proof, if proof is needed, that North Korea is a de facto monarchy.
From a site called "NK News".
Aurobindo among the occultists
Guess where Aurobindo got his ideas from?
Of course it's Western occultism. Or maybe even Jewish occultism!
Monday, January 25, 2021
Granskande journalistik
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Så här ser "den granskande journalistiken" ut i USA just nu. Ett exempel bland många.
Från Yahoo News. Språket är engelska.
Sunday, January 24, 2021
The death of right populism?
An article from the leftist magazine Dissent criticizing American "right populism" as nothing more than a front for the usual elite capitalist interests.
By "right populism", the author evidently means a movement that is socially conservative but economically progressive, and hence oriented to the working class.
The author regards such movements as non-existent or wholly fake, at least in the United States. His solution is to make US elections more democratic, which he believes will favor leftists (real progressives).
But what if they actually favor real "right populists"?
Be careful what you wish for...
Världens mest förföljda religion?
Förföljelser av *kristna* ökar i världen, delvis som en följd av coronapandemin.
Batshit crazy
This is an unintentionally funny clip about a scholarly postmodernist conference, "posthuman feminism and new materialism" to be exact.
It´s morbidly fascinating to watch the confused "scholars" (really some kind of failed avant-garde artists and slacktivistas) spew incomprehensible postmodernist rhetoric with an entirely straight face. They even talk about "research" and "methodology", while of course doing nothing of the sort.
Instead, the conference participants spend their time dancing, doing avant-garde art, and being generally embarrasing. One of the "women" is actually a transvestite dressed in a hat with big mouse ears!
Batshit crazy.
While most of these postmodernists are apparently Australians marooned in Britain, their American counterparts are happy now, after Biden and Harris won the recent US elections. This is America. This is the contemporary West. This is us now.
Batshit crazy, I say!
"We can take that place"
A news report on the Capitol breach. Note that the reporter followed the protesters into the actual Capitol building! Despite only being a five-minute segment, it´s interesting and also raises *a lot* of questions...
Saturday, January 23, 2021
Ultima Thule shall rise again
Tfw you completed the system of German idealism by deriving all its principles from an absolute ground.
Grand Dragon Joe Biden, the first of his name, must secure Greenland, find Atlantis and usher in new golden age of Hyperborean race!
#EsotericBidenism
And then they came for the Trotskyites
Facebook is now attacking the far left, including the BLM-loving and lock down-craving Socialist Workers Party in Britain. Who gave Zucc his marching orders?
I'm not familiar with the British SWP's take on on-line censorship, but WSWS has consistently opposed it, while otherwise sounding pretty much like CNN. So they are actually being consistent here.
Facebook attacks WSWS, British SWP
Friday, January 22, 2021
Against Swedish exceptionalism
A ghost is stalking Swedish historiography. The ghost of Swedish exceptionalism. Only one man can exorcise it. His name? Erik Bengtsson...
Jokes aside, Erik Bengtsson's recently published book "Världens jämlikaste land?" is a polemic against a strong exceptionalist strand in Swedish history writing, according to which modern Swedish equality, democracy and societal peace have deep roots in the pre-modern past, among the peasantry in particular, and that Sweden is therefore unique among the nations. The author, a leftist historian, begs to disagree. His book deals with the period from the mid-18th century until today.
All nations in the world believe themselves to be unique in some ways, so in context, claims of Swedish exceptionalism are - ironically enough - unexceptional. It's really a kind of Swedish national myth.
The author believes that Sweden, if anything, was *less* equal and democratic than other European nations during the 19th century, including its neighbors Denmark and Norway. In 1867 (when Sweden had just gotten its first modern Parliament), only 21% of adult Swedish males had the right to vote (and only to the lower house). In the same year, the figures for Germany and France were 100%, Denmark 73%, Britain 59% and Norway 33%. Swedish local elections were completely undemocratic, with the rich having more votes than the poor, since one person could have more than one vote, and the number of votes were tied to private fortunes. Even private companies could vote! Some Swedish towns were literal "company towns", with virtually all votes in the hands of one private business. The upper house of Parliament was appointed by these grossly undemocratic local governments. The author isn't impressed by the pre-1860's political system either. While the Swedish peasants were recognized as a separate estate in the Diet, they had much fewer delegates than the nobility, despite being the majority of the population. At the local level, the parish councils (sockenstämmor) did include (male) peasants, but excluded landless laborers and the unemployed - a substantial portion of the population, especially when population levels started to rise during the 19th century.
Bengtsson is critical to the often repeated notion that the Swedish peasantry was "free" and therefore an important democratic force of ancient provenance. The so-called royal peasants (kronobönder) weren't free at all, living on land owned by a noble and forced to work it on his behalf. But even land-owning peasants were hardly "free" in our sense of the term, since they were forced to pay extortionate taxes. (I assume the males could also be drafted by the military.)
The author believes that the workers and landless rural laborers were a more important force for democracy. The upper layer of the peasantry became increasingly reactionary and entered an alliance with the conservative forces in the "modern" bichameral Parliament after the Estates had been abolished.
As for economic "equality", Sweden during the 19th century was probably on current "Latin American" levels of inequality, and often compared negatively with other European nations at the time. The nobility dominated politics and the military even after their political privileges had been abolished. Paradoxically, however, Sweden was more peaceful than more democratic nations, such as Germany or the United States. Since those nations still had a large degree of inequality, more democracy meant that their elections became another arena for social conflict, often leading to fraud or violence. The quasi-democratic system in Sweden, by contrast, led to peaceful co-existence between a number of elite and special interest groups, and widespread de-politization of the excluded majority. (Apparently, historians often complain about how incredibly boring Swedish politics were circa 1870!)
The author believes that it was precisely the widespread inequality and exclusion that made it possible to create a uniquely broad coalition of forces for democratic and social change. "Everyone" (except a small elite) had grievances against the system. Although Bengtsson at times sound like a Marxist, he nevertheless supports the Social Democratic-Liberal alliance which eventually overturned "the old regime" in favor of a modern democracy with universal suffrage. While the process wasn't entirely peaceful, it was much less violent than in many other nations, perhaps because of the broad unity of forces on the democratic side. In the end, the bourgeoisie (and its noble appendages) decided to adapt itself to the new situation.
While the book is interesting, I think its polemical attitude against the exceptionalists is unhelpful. At one point, Bengtsson almost mocks the Social Democratic writer Fredrik Ström who in 1944 wrote that there is a continuity between the labor movement and earlier freedom fighters such as Engelbrekt, Puke, Vasa, Dacke, all the way to the liberal "People's Parliaments" of the 19th century. Exclaims Bengtsson: "How can you oppose the injustices of your society in the name of the traditions of the same society". But surely there *is* a continuity, certainly indirectly (why can't 19th century workers reading about 15th century rebel leader Engelbrekt be inspired by his example?), but in some cases even directly. Bengtsson himself believes that there is a kind of continuity at least during the 19th century between the Dissenters and prohibitionists on the one hand, and the somewhat later labor movement on the other. But surely Dissenters existed in Sweden long before the mid-19th century? And what about peasant resistance (and peasant attitudes towards both their masters and their neighbors) before the mid-19th century? Bengtsson responds to two other historians who point out that the Scandinavian-American areas are more equal than other parts of the United States, that the "unique egalitarian values" of these people didn't seem to work in Sweden. But this is a strange argument, since the values of the people (or the migrants) might have been very different from those of the Swedish nobility, even apart from the fact that every society has a "counter-culture" to the official one. It's almost as if Bengtsson in his eagerness to polemicize forgets his own insight that Sweden was indeed a deeply divided society! Oh, and Olof Palme was a Baltic German noble.
"Världens jämlikaste land?" is nevertheless an interesting book, and a necessary antidote to a certain kind of classless and anachronistic idealization of the Swedish past. It's main point seems to be that positive progressive changes in a society are the result of concrete political actions under certain modern conditions. No mysterious essence is at play.
Personally, however, I suspect there just might be deep differences between various cultures, even if "only" historical ones, that plays a larger role than we would like to think...
Thursday, January 21, 2021
Veckans Strasser
Den här bloggens populäraste inslag är tillbaka...
Jag lovade ju att inte längre kommentera dagspolitik, men jag kan inte låta bli att länka till den här artikeln. Den har dessutom en mer principiell betydelse.
The new class war
The new class war will be between have-nots dependent on fossil fuels and haves who can afford electric cars (and get them subsidized by the state at the expense of the have-nots). Good luck to everyone sorting this one out!
From the dreamland of California.
Black and Latino leaders criticize California's ban on natural gas
Buy this girl some ice cream
Some important news from the trenches.
Btw, Biden just destroyed 40,000 jobs in Canada by banning the Keystone pipeline. But whatever.
Wednesday, January 20, 2021
Donald Trump's Rubi-Con
Instead of writing an extended analysis of the Trump presidency, I might just as well link to a piece I wrote back in 2016.
I think I nailed it...
With that, I will probably stop commenting day-to-day politics on this blog.
All quiet at the Rubicon...for now
Joe, say it aint so
The latest QAnon conspiracy theory is...
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
That JOE BIDEN is a secret member of QAnon!
The show must go on, I suppose.
Day One
I'm sure Joe has a solution to this. Right?
LOL.
Canada should retaliate against Biden's wrong-headed decision to cancel Keystone
En sista hälsning?
Många inom QAnon-miljön har reagerat på en märklig detalj från Trumps avskedsceremoni.
Det var 17 amerikanska fanor bakom podiet.
Jaha, undrar ni kanske.
Gissa vilken som är den sjuttonde bokstaven i alfabetet?
Just det.
Q.
Detta kan *inte* vara en slump. Jag menar allvar. Trump är ett troll eller en show man, så det skulle inte alls förvåna mig om detta var medvetet.
Sedan undrar man ju lite över "autism-nivån" på personer som krampaktigt räknar antalet flaggor på en TV-sänd ceremoni, men whatever...
Absolutely bizarre
%2C_seen_holding_a_Qanon_sign_(cropped).jpg)
This is the actual moment when "the Q Shaman" enters the Senate chamber and becomes Vice President for a minute or two.
Absolutely freakin' bizarre.
%2C_Raigad%2C_Maharashtra.jpg)
Sveket från Åsa Linderborg
Har Åsa Linderborg svikit kommunismen?
Från Aftonbladet.
"Det spelar ingen roll om man säger att Trump ljuger"
Tuesday, January 19, 2021
Quad: The secret plan for countering China
Some analysts associated with the Trump Administration has leaked a document outlining the US strategy to counter China. Or perhaps what should have been the US strategy, since neither Trump nor Pompeo really followed it.
The "Indo-Pacific" or "Quad" strategy was perhaps leaked in order to lobby the incoming Biden administration to adopt it. It calls for stronger US ties with Australia, India and Japan to push back China's increased hegemonic ambitions in the region and beyond. Military encirclement seems to be part of the equation.
The article argues that although Trump was (of course) anti-Chinese, his nativist impulses and generally erratic course made the strategy difficult to implement. At one point, Trump even threatened to withdraw US forces from Japan! Pompeo, by contrast, wanted complete US hegemony in the Indo-Pacific, rather than the "multi-polar" approach of the Quad.
It will indeed be interesting to see if Biden will break up the globalist-Chinese alliance, and if so, to what end...
The secret plan for countering China
The Five Crises of the American Regime
"Left-Conservative" (?) author Michael Lind strikes again. I have previously linked to his articles on foreign policy and reviewed his book "The New Class War".
In the article linked below, published in the Jewish magazine Tablet, Lind tries to place the storming of the Capitol on January 6 (which he blames on Trump) in a broader context.
Lind holds both Republicans and Democrats responsible for the increased polarization, going all the way back to Newt Gingrich's term as Republican Speaker of the House and the GOP weaponization of impeachment during the Clinton-Lewinsky affair. More recently, there are the actions of the Democrats: the bizarre conspiracy theory that Trump is a Russian agent, the 2020 impeachment, and the BLM-ANTIFA riots, which Lind see as a Democratic provocation. So while Lind denies election fraud and sharply condemns Trump, he nevertheless believes that the Capitol breach is part of a much larger scenario.
Culturally, that context includes increasing anomie, rootlessness and restlessness. Lind identifies five long term crises of the US system, including multi-culturalism, unaccountable political elites, and a globalized economy destroying real jobs. He fears that the increase in male working class unemployment and poverty is a ticking time bomb. All over the world, restless young men form the backbone of terrorist and extremist movements (and crime gangs).
For Lind's proposed solutions (or lack of them), see my review of "The New Class War" elsewhere on this blog.
The rebirth of the Left Conservative tradition
A somewhat strange (and strangely in-house) article published in the Jewish-American magazine Tablet.
It deals with the phenomenon (baffling to many leftists and liberals) of voters being "left" on economic issues but "right" on so-called cultural issues. The author dubs this "left-conservatism".
The article is too "intellectual" for my tastes, but I offer it for what it's worth...
Trumpism without Trump?
So you thought it was all over? Think again, buster!
Trump may be out, but "Trumpism" is alive and kicking. From the "post-liberal" site UnHerd.
THAT'S THE LAST STRAW I'M OFFICIALLY OFF THE TRUMP TRAIN
It could have been much worse. They could have written "QAnon".
Most bizarre news item so far? Like ever.
An ordinary Joe
A crazy news story about a pigeon named after Joe Biden, a bizarre tweet from the Prime Minister of Australia, a strange world record, and a happy ending.
Nothing about QAnon, though.
Note for Swedish readers: a "bar-tailed godwit" is called "myrspov" in Swedish.
Pompeo for President?
An interesting article on Pompeo's (and Trump's) foreign policy, and some speculations about his future ambitions.
The article points out that Pompeo haven't disavowed Trump, and wonders aloud if he wants to run for the presidency himself.
Note also that Trump prefers sanctions to war, but that the sanctions aren't working...
Presumably, whoever wrote the article therefore wants Biden to start some new wars!
PS. The link isn't working. Try search for "Pompeo doubles down on defending Trump, positions himself as the president's successor" on Yahoo News.
Monday, January 18, 2021
The anomalous ape
There are two species of chimpanzees: the Common Chimpanzee and the Bonobo (or Pygmy Chimpanzee). While the common version can be aggressive, hunts, and is "patriarchal", the Bonobo is almost entirely peaceful, vegan and "matriarchal" (and bisexual, but that's another show). In a bizarre way, the two species are mirror images of each other.
Since both species are closely related to humans, I liked to use the Bonobo as "evidence" that humans might have been peaceful in the distant past, and that we can become so again. (See other posts on this blog.)
Which - obviously - is not the case.
The Bonobo has sexual dimorphism, with the males being larger than the females. The males also have canine teeth. This makes no sense, evolutionarily speaking, for a peaceful matriarchal creature. It's therefore reasonable to assume that the Bonobo is derived from Common Chimpanzee stock, where these traits *do* make sense.
All Common Chimpanzees aren't brutal killer-apes, of course. New research suggests that chimpanzees can adopt a variety of strategies, probably dependent on available resources. In zoos, where food is no problem, the levels of aggression are lower than in the wild, and the "patriarchal" structure is replaced by two parallel hierarchies, one male, the other female. In the wild, aggression levels are different in different groups. However, the aggressive strategy is presumably always an option in relatively lean areas. The Bonobo could be an off-shot from some relatively peaceful group of common chimps, which took the peaceful strategy to its extreme. Natural selection changed their behavior, but not their physical appearence.
I assume the Bonobo is perfectly, and permanently, adapted to a situation of resource abundance. So why bother fighting? They don't even fight other Bonobo bands. Of course, this "hippie love summer" strategy doesn't seem to be working anymore. The Bonobo is on the verge of extinction, only living in a few areas of the Congo rain forest. Still, for millions of years, the Bonobo has existed as a weird anomaly in the outskirts of hominoid evolution.
Humans are much closer to the Common Chimpanzee. On the one hand, we are even more flexible. Not only can we live in peace if resources are abundant, we might even stop dominance behavior (while chimps sometimes "chimp out" even in a zoo, due to dominance issues). Our gender roles are more flexible than those of any ape. On the other hand, however, humans certainly have the capacity for aggression, violence, dominance and even outright evil - as seen from history, where these strategies are far more common (certainly towards out-groups) than peace, love and understanding...
Humans thus seem to be "clever common chimps" rather than Bonobos forever stuck in summerland. If that's good or some kind of evolutionary tragedy is of course an interesting question...
The forever war (Addendum)
Here are some additions to my main review of Steven LeBlanc's "Constant Battles".
There is very little evidence that Native peoples are "inherent conservationists" and essentially none that they have a conscious "conservation ethic" (the author doesn't even mention the issue!).
Foragers ("hunters-gatherers") are above all opportunists. They exploit whatever resources are at hand, without thinking about the long-term consequences. Indeed, they *can't afford* thinking "long term". The food must be collected *now*, while it's available, and usually can't be stored. And while good year might alternate with lean years, on average foragers tend to live in conditions of scarcity, not some kind of "Stone Age abundance".
And yes, they do degrade their environment. The Plains Indians hunted bison (buffalo) by stampeding entire flocks off cliffs. Only some of the dead animals were used for food or hides. Most were left to rot. At the West Coast, the Natives harvested clams. The method was unsustainable, since the clams harvested each year were smaller than the year before - suggesting that larger clams were collected to extinction at the locality in question. Seals stopped forming colonies at the shores, instead moving to islands, to escape the human hunters.
Anthropological studies of current foragers point in the same direction. The Hadza in East Africa (distant cousins of the Bushmen) are foragers in a harsh environment and would therefore be expected to be "conservationist". They are not. "When women dig up roots, they do not attempt to replace any portion of the plant to grow again. ... When a woman is building the framework of her grass hut, she is as likely to use branches from berry trees as from any other type of tree. ... When a nest of wild bees is found and raided for its honey, no portion of the comb is left to encourage the bees to stay on. ... There are no inhibitions about shooting females (even pregnant females) or immature animals. ... If two animals are killed on the same day, the more distant one may be abandoned".
No "inherent" conservationism here.
If humans were ever natural conservationists, we would expect island populations to be in perfect balance with their environment. Instead, both island foragers and farmers usually outstrip the island's carrying capacity, with endemic warfare, cannibalism and a population crash as possible results. Most endemic animal species are exterminated.
When New Zealand was colonized by the Maori, 26 species of flightless birds (including 11 species of moa) were hunted for food and wiped out in a matter of centuries. Similar scenarios have repeated themselves in many other island theatres: Malta, Madagascar, Hawaii, the Caribbean...
LeBlanc discusses the small island of Tikopia in Polynesia. It's only six square miles. Before Europeans reached the island, it's total population never exceeded 1,000 people. It seems the Tikopians *did* have a conservationist ethos of sorts. Population growth was stopped by widespread infanticide and abortion. Sometimes, people deemed superfluous were forced to emigrate (most probably drowned at sea trying to reach Melanesia, where they might have been eaten by the local cannibals - no Tikopian settlements outside Tikopia have ever been found). Thus, sustainability is possible - if you can stomach the literal killing of surplus population.
Most, alas, cannot. When Christian missionaries came to Tikopia, they suppressed the population control measures. The population increased, and soon the island had to import food. Nothing wrong with that, per se, but if population control had been suppressed before the colonial powers had outlawed war, the Tikopians would presumably have been forced to remain on their little island - and starved to death (or resorted to cannibalism).
What about the Native peoples who were peaceful when Europeans first contacted them? Don't such cases prove that Eden once existed? Not really, according to LeBlanc. Often, oral tradition, rock art or archaeology prove that the peaceful people in question were war-prone just a century earlier. The author believes that the peacefulness of many American Indians was, ironically, due to the population crash that followed in the wake of European conquest due to disease. In some areas, the depopulation was so radical that the remaining Natives had no competition and lived well below carrying capacity. This actually made them peaceful (until the White settlers took their land, forcing them on the war path again). Another factor "post-contact" is improved technology. If Natives get hold of, say, steel axes, they might increase the carrying capacity of their area since new resources can be exploited, but if the population remains low, peace follows. Of course, there are also many instances were new technology, such as hunting rifles, leads to super-exploitation of game animals...
The forever war
"Constant Battles: Why We Fight" is a 2003 book by Steven A LeBlanc. Katherine E Register is credited as co-author. The book is "politically incorrect" and probably not for the (liberal or leftist) faint of heart. It would have shocked me 15 years ago when many of my own views were similar to those the author is criticizing (see many other posts on this blog). Today, I believe that the Hobbsian-Malthusian perspective of LeBlanc is probably true. And in contrast to him, I 'm not convinced that the modern world can remedy the situation...
The thesis of the book can be summarized thus: "the noble savage" never existed. Stone Age and Native peoples have almost never lived in ecological balance with Nature, and while peaceful periods have existed, they were shorter than the periods when warfare was endemic. Population growth and over-exploitation of natural resources are the main reasons for warfare in pre-state societies. Complex societies are usually also war-prone, and only with the advent of modern high technology and organization has it become at least potentially possible to minimize armed conflict and environmental degradation. In other words, modernity is our best hope for peace and sustainability, not a "primitivist" return to a purely imaginary Golden Age.
Although the author is inspired by sociobiology, and discusses violence among chimpanzees at some length, his perspective is actually more "socio" than "biology". War and aggression are not hard-wired into our genes. In fact, most people hate war and quickly revert to peaceful relations if possible. Thus, the author believes that the Natives of New Guinea supported the rule of the colonial powers, since it brought peace. The problem is that most humans most of the time live in conditions when war makes more sense - if not to them, at least to their enemies! This restarts the cycle, again and again. Before colonialism, the Papuans in the New Guinea highlands had been isolated from the outside world (including the evil patriarchal Indo-Europeans) for about 40,000 years. Warfare was endemic. They really lived in a Hobbesian nightmare.
The author argues in some detail that Stone Age and Native peoples do *not* have "plenty of food", "more leisure" than modern Westerners, perpetual peace or a "conservationist ethic". I have to say that some of the studies cited to prove this were *extremely* sloppy, including the classical survey of !Kung Bushmen foragers, which didn't take into consideration that the Kalahari Natives have access to cars (the cars of the anthropologists making the survey, to be exact) or steel axes, both of which make foraging easier than in the past. They also missed the salient fact that the gathered nuts must be processed at camp before becoming edible. So no, the !Kung probably didn't have shorter work days during the Paleolithic than the average modern Swedish employee...
LeBlanc devotes several chapters to evidence for warfare among Bushmen, Hopi, Eskimoes, Aborigines and other Native groups. The fierce Yanomami make a brief guest appearence. Nor was the Stone Age particularly peaceful. The author believes there is enough evidence for murder, massacres and even cannibalism from that period. He wonders why the earliest known human settlement, the Paleolithic site at Dolne Vestonice, was a longhouse surrounded by a fence made of mammoth tusks, and placed strategically on a little hill? And why did all Stone Age people keep dogs? Dogs, for some reason, bark. Wolves don't. Why was the ability to bark selected for? Was it *only* to scare away wild animals from the settlement? That's unlikely, as animals fear fire (and learned to fear humans). Of course they were guard dogs, warning against human strangers.
The main reason for war, at least in a pre-state society, is resource scarcity. Humans can and do increase the carrying capacity of their natural environment, but this virtually always leads to population growth, and hence to further scarcity ahead. This doesn't mean that humans are unable to understand the problem. Quite the contrary. Many cultures try to control their population growth. Infanticide, abortion and birth spacing are common methods. Others include women "marrying out" and hence joining other groups, or emigration of a portion of the group. Unfortunately, none of these methods ever work in the long run. Pre-state societies haven't got enough power to force everyone to abide by the rules. Often, neither pre-state nor state societies *want* to follow them. The more populous a polity is, the more warriors or soldiers can it mobilize. This forces the enemies to increase their populations, too, and so it continues. The author points out that war itself can be seen as a population control measure, and so can famine. Indeed, states often force part of their population to starve for this reason, as when Britain didn't care about the potato famine in Ireland.
Interestingly, the author has some problems explaining state warfare, since a strong state can control its population through famine, and therefore (ironically) should be more peaceful to its neighbors, since the resources are now in balance. He has even more trouble explaining modern wars, which he sees as almost irrational. It's almost as if the author so strongly want to believe in the salvific power of modernity that he doesn't see that modern polities too are based on super-exploitation. Besides, the observation that if one nation changes, every other nation must change in the same way or be eaten, works pretty well as an explanation for why no modern power can take a step back in order to become more peaceful and Green. Japan saved itself from imperialism by becoming imperialist, and China saved itself from globalism by becoming more globalist.
I think the author's myopia is tied to his class position. He seems to be a pretty privileged guy. All his friends go on honeymoon to Greece, or take long hikes in the hills, with full modern outfitting, of course. His students have standard liberal values of the kind popular in the suburban middle class. No hard feelings, but I can't help thinking that our author might be a bit insulated from, say, world imperialism...
LeBlanc (and Register) hopes that the modern world of efficient state powers can be used to bring about a world of plenty for all and hence of peace. One positive sign is that the population growth in the Western world (and Japan) is close to zero. But what if the plenty of modern societies is dependent on the poverty of all the rest? Or if the plenty of all comes at a high price for the environment?
Then, it seems, all the old crap will return with a vengeance...
I can't say I like that perspective.
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