"The Singular Mind of Terry Tao" and choosing a career . . .

The New York Times published the following really quite fascinating article today:

The Singular Mind of Terry Tao
by Gareth Cook
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/26/magazine/the-singular-mind-of-terry-tao.html

I particularly like the article's description of the game of devil's chess - an imaginary game which not only really seems to get at how a mathematician works but also captures some of what it takes to be a successful mathematician.

From a personal perspective, I really liked what I thought mathematics was in high school and it turned out that I was quite good at it. By the start of my last year of high school, I had decided that I would pursue a career in pure mathematics. Fortunately, at about that time my sister Colette arranged for me to meet a University of Alberta mathematics professor for an hour or so. This turned out to be one of the best spent hours of my career as I not only got a tiny sense of what pure mathematics actually was but I figured out that it was not the aspect of mathematics that I was actually interested in*. The professor figured this out as well and suggested that I consider going into applied mathematics or possibly even computing science. I had read one or two books on computer programming but this discussion with the math prof is what really crystallized my interest in computing. In hindsight, it turned out to be one of the best spent hours of my career.

* Once I actually started university, I quickly learned a bit more of what mathematics is and soon developed a constructive proof that I wasn't actually all that good at most of it. Going into pure mathematics would have been a real fiasco!

10 Reasons Why Hidden Cancer Cure Conspiracy Theories Fail

The truth of the situation is really quite simple. The scientists, not to mention the corporations and the institutions that they work for, are even more motivated to find and make available a "cure for cancer" as you are to see such a cure available.

10 Reasons Why Hidden Cancer Cure Conspiracy Theories Fail

The list, in abbreviated form, is reproduced here just in case the link goes dead. You really want to click through the link to get the details presented there.

1. Not all organizations involved in medical research are for-profit
2. Medical researchers and their families are just as susceptible to cancer and other diseases as anyone else
3. Even the CEOs of companies won’t be able to utilize their billions if they’re dead from something their companies could have cured
4. Many if not most researchers are more likely to value fame, prestige and personal achievement over sheer quantity of money
5. While all governments would have to be in on it, not all would make money
6. Pushback from insurance companies (they make money by reducing the amount that they pay to "big pharma")
7. Actually, companies WOULD make a lot of money from cures
8. Companies are already choosing cure or prevention over profit
9. There’s more than one for-profit company out there, which means competition
10. Hiding the cure would cost more

Nuf said!

Knowledge is better than ignorance . . .

There is precisely one sense in which it is possible for me to "like" a news article that explains how the massacre at Srebrenica was, through at best wilful blindness and at worst malice aforethought, allowed to occur by the UN in general and the UK and the US in particular. Namely that it is better to know than to remain in doubt.

It was clear at the time that the UN "safe areas" had become nothing of the sort. It was also soon clear that "something bad" had happened when Srebrenica had been overrun by the Serbs. The magnitude of what happened has become clear over the years as the count of recovered bodies of the victims have mounted. Now, the long suspected if not understood but relatively unspoken "why" has been laid out for all to read.

It is good to see comprehensive descriptions and analyses of what and why Srebrenica was allowed to occur. It is even better that confirmation of what was often "wondered at" by many has been published while many of those involved in the decision making process are still alive.

How Britain and the US decided to abandon Srebrenica to its fate (article by Florence Hartmann and Ed Vulliamy in The Guardian July 4, 2015)

Le sang de la realpolitik - L'affaire Srebrenica (about to be published eBook by Florence Hartmann; referenced in the above referenced article)

FLORENCE HARTMANN GUILTY FOR TELLING THE TRUTH (as if the world needed it, yet another demonstration of what happens to whistleblowers)

Srebrenica_massacre (Wikipedia's article on the Srebrenica massacre)

Srebrenica massacre (Encyclopaedia Britannica article on the Srebrenica massacre)

Serbia asks Russia to veto UN resolution that calls Srebrenica massacre ‘genocide’ (article by "Staff" on the GlobalNews.ca site July 4, 2015)

Army of God?

I happen to believe that the vast majority of people, irrespective of their cultural background or religious beliefs, are peaceful law-abiding members of their society. The risk that they will plan or participate in a terrorist attack is essentially zero.

The reason that I believe this is really quite simple - if the vast majority of people were not peaceful law-abiding members of their society then the world would exist in a state of near total chaos. I'm not talking about a couple of newsworthy attacks a week. I'm talking about nearly continuous widespread major terrorist events occurring all over the world on an essentially continuous basis. There would be literally hundreds of major attacks per day where a major attack would be defined as an attack killing at least 1,000 people. The human civilization all over the world would simply collapse into a state far far worse than the Dark Ages.

Since human civilization has obviously not collapsed and is in fact thriving by most measures, the vast majority of people, irrespective of their cultural background or religious beliefs, must be peaceful law-abiding members of their society.

What we do have is formal and informal groups of people all over the world who, for various reasons, have decided to "go rogue". More accurately, they have decided to attack those whom they perceive as being their oppressors (note that it does not matter whether or not those that they attack actually are their oppressors - all that is required to create the situation we see in the world today is that a relatively modest number of groups of people are attacking who they perceive to be their oppressors).

We do indeed live in interesting times . . .

Army of God? Here are 6 modern-day Christian terrorist groups you never hear about (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/04/army-of-god-here-are-6-modern-day-christian-terrorist-groups-you-never-hear-about/)

What's on the other side of the ocean?

This is a seriously cool map. It shows what you would 'see' if you could see the first major land mass directly east or directly west from the shores of North America.  I particularly like the 'view' from Argentina and southern Chile.

Click through on the link below for a larger version.

Map by Eric Odenheimer (I've not been able to chase down the actual original posting and I'm not at all sure which Eric Odenheimer is actually responsible for the map).

http://mentalfloss.com/article/57677/whats-other-side-ocean?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=atlasobscura

The US religious right's use and abuse of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's legacy

You have probably never heard of Dietrich Bonhoeffer so a quick biography is in order (Dietrich Bonhoeffer on Wikipedia is as good a place as any to start if you want a more detailed biography).

Bonhoeffer was a Christian pastor in Germany before and during the Second World War. He found the Nazis and their acts to be so offensive that he participated in the German Resistance. He was imprisoned by the Nazis in April of 1943 where he remained until he was tried and executed/murdered on 9 April 1945 for his association with participants of the 20 July 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler (the same one that the relatively recent movie Valkyrie staring Tom Cruise popularized).

Bonhoeffer studied and taught at the Union Theological Seminary in New York in the early 1930s. He found the progressive institution's stance less than satisfying, once stating "There is no theology here". His views on the US fundamentalist Christian theology of the era were not exactly flattering either as he accused the Southern Baptists of preaching “the crassest orthodoxy…an unrelenting harshness in holding on to one’s possessions, possessions either of this or of the other world.”

The US religious right has recently been invoking the name of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Their claim is essentially that Bonhoeffer's decision to risk death by participating in the German resistance is an exemplar which justifies the use of deadly force to resist the "imposition" of gay marriage on the US Christian community.

Bonhoeffer died resisting the Nazi regime which was not only responsible for launching the deadliest war in human history but also embarked on a program of industrialized murder to "deal with" their opponents and anyone else that they happened to not like (see Nazi concentration camp badges for more info).

That the US religious right could somehow create a parallel between their strong opposition to gay marriage and Bonhoeffer' decision to participate in the German Resistance during the Second World War truly boggles the mind. Then again, there is little that the US religious right does these days which doesn't boggle the mind . . .

Some sources and references are probably in order:

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dietrich_Bonhoeffer
• Nazi concentration camp badges  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_concentration_camp_badges
• Why This Pastor Who Tried To Assassinate Hitler Has Become A Hero To The Anti-LGBT Movement http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2015/04/14/3646532/conservatives-comparing-anti-lgbt-crusade-pastors-attempt-assassinate-hitler/

Why the Crown has invoked Justin Bieber in the Mike Duffy trial

The Justin Bieber reference was used by the Crown to make an important point. The Canadian Constitution requires that Senators meet certain qualifications including that they be at least 30 years old and residents of the province that they are appointed to represent. The witness was recently retired Senate law clerk Mark Audcent (a recognized expert in Canadian constitutional law as it applies to the Senate). Crown attorney Mark Holmes asked Mr. Audcent the following question:

“If the Governor-General, acting on the advice of the Prime Minister, appointed Justin Bieber to the Senate tomorrow, would he become 30?”

Mr. Audcent replied "Of course not". The implication being that someone does not "magically" become a resident of a province just because the Governor-General, acting on the advice of the Prime Minister, appoints that person to the Senate as a representative of said province. Mr. Holmes is obviously building a case for the proposition that Mike Duffy was not qualified to represent PEI as a Senator because his appointment to the Senate as a representative of PEI violated the Canadian Constitution.

The Prime Minister who appointed Mike Duffy would, of course, be none other than the Right Honourable Stephen Harper. Based on the above testimony and other testimony by Mr. Audcent over the past couple of days, Mr. Holmes would seem to be well on his way towards establishing this point.

According to Wikipedia, Stephen Harper made the following solemn oath when he was sworn in as Prime Minister:

"I, (name), do solemnly and sincerely promise and swear (or declare) that I will truly and faithfully, and to the best of my skill and knowledge, execute the powers and trust reposed in me as Prime Minister, so help me God."

I have a feeling that this will not be the last time during this trial that Prime Minister Harper is revealed to have at least arguably if not actually violated his oath of office (pay particular attention to the word "trust" in the above oath).

Sidebar: It is true that people have been appointed to the Senate to represent various far flung provinces even though the Senate appointees have lived for many many years outside of their home provinces. The difference between what happened with Mike Duffy and what happened with Pamela Wallin vs these appointments from the past is that those being considered for appointment to the Senate in the past for provinces that they were no longer residents of were apparently told to move back to their home provinces and live there long enough to establish residency. Once residency had been established, the Prime Minister of the day would advise the Governor-General to appoint them to the Senate. In other words, these other Prime Ministers understood that they were bound by the Constitution - an understanding that Prime Minister Harper apparently does not share with his predecessors.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/crown-invokes-justin-bieber-in-mike-duffy-trial/article23882827/