Mr. Topp and the Big Bad Blog

Since pre-history — before the beginnings of the Big Bad Blog — I have avoided eating tuna. I love tuna, but the tuna fishing industry appears determined to set fishing quotas that will lead to extinction, and then disregard those quotas and over-fish. I cannot consciously make decisions that lead to the probable extinction of a species, so I no longer buy or eat tuna.

Today, I find a second reason: Dolphin-safe tuna. Apparently, in order to make tuna dolphin safe, the fishermen must inadvertently kill a whole lot of other fish. Making tuna fishing safer for dolphins means making it more dangerous for every other fish in the sea.

So tuna: You’re still in my doghouse.

(by Delpht)

In 1972, the Procrastinators Club of America attempted to return the liberty bell.

Currently, 15% of Americans represent themselves as belonging to no religion. This is expected to increase to 25% over the next twenty years. US News examines the political ramifications.

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An editor at Investor’s Business Daily has wrote an editorial bashing the plans for a government-run healthcare plan in the United States. Originally included in the article (which has since been edited) was the following paragraph:

People such as scientist Stephen Hawking wouldn’t have a chance in the U.K., where the National Health Service would say the life of this brilliant man, because of his physical handicaps, is essentially worthless.

Hawking, of course, is British, and has lived and worked in the UK for his entire life.

The paragraph has since been removed from the editorial, with the following note:
Editor’s Note: This version corrects the original editorial which implied that physicist Stephen Hawking, a professor at the University of Cambridge, did not live in the UK.

Luckily the folks at Dispatches from the Culture Wars found it, and cut-and-pasted the text for posterity.

The tenor of the article is unchanged following the editing. Despite realising that there is evidence to the contrary, it continues to argue that a person such as Stephen Hawking would not receive the health care he needs under a British-style system of healthcare. Removing the specific Hawking reference does not change the fact that the arguments being made are blatantly untrue, with Hawking as an excellent counter-example.

Listening to the health care argument in the United States is quite painful. The Republicans are clearly not fans, but refuse to come out and say why. They believe that government should be less involved in people’s day-to-day lives, not more. They believe that people selling and buying services are better off working out the logistics themselves, and that it will produce a better result than interference might.

In the midst of a recession brought about by unchecked free-market forces, however, they feel it is politically unwise to express such views in public. So instead, they fabricate other arguments — lies, if you will — in an effort to bring about results which are based on the above-mentioned beliefs.

Those opposed to health care reform in the United States should have their opinions respected, not mocked. In order to do that, they need to share their opinions so an open and honest debate can take place. Intellectually dishonest arguments which fly in the face of observable truth will continue to be met with disdain.

observations and opinions health care, politics, stephen hawking, united states

Most people know that many polls are flawed, and that the information taken from any given poll is probably unreliable. This week the Globe and Mail provides an excellent example.

The question is: Are social sciences and arts being underfunded?

To answer this in a satisfactory answer, you would need to know the following:

a) What do you consider to be adequate funding?
b) What funding is currently available?

If the answer to b is significantly below a, you should answer “yes”. If not, you should answer “no”. The more philosophic amongst us might wonder if any such broad a topic of academic endeavour can ever truly be adequately funded — there are always more theories to be tested, books to be written, et cetera.

However, if one remains of the practical belief that a reasonable number that would constitute adequate funding can be found, question a must be tackled. One way to go about might be to see what funding level is being requested, and find out what gets dropped as part of the difference between the two numbers.

In any case, it is clearly not a simple question at all, but one that requires some research and reflection. Here are your options on the globe and mail poll:

Yes – they are as important as science and technology
and
No – science and technology is more important

Note the reference to science and technology. What does this have to do with funding for the arts and social sciences? Are science and technology being funded at their expense? Or do they just get more money?

Here the Globe and Mail has decided that you — the responder — need not know any actual facts about the situation. You do not need to know how much the social sciences and arts receive. Or how much they want. Or be given information to make up your own mind on how much they need. It becomes “what do you value Science more than Art?”

A question, of course, aimed to show that the Harper government’s policy (which almost certainly funds science and technology with higher figures — scientific studies, on average, are much more expensive to run) is out of touch and underfunds the arts. What the arts actually need, and whether they are actually underfunded — well, that has no bearing on the answer to the question.

The question — of whether adequate funding exists — can be considered without considering the funding levels for other areas. If the answer is “No”, then other questions might arise, such as where to make up that shortfall, and even “do we really need to fund this adequately.”

By introducing science and technology into the answers, one does not have the option of saying: Yes, I think that the arts and social sciences are adequately funded, but they are no more important than science and technology. They just require less money. If you think it’s adequately funded, you must also think that science is more important.

This is not so. Shame on you Globe and Mail. You should not be so partisan.

(Note: I do not know how well or poorly the arts and social sciences are funded. I cannot answer the Globe and Mail’s question. My mock “answer” above does not necessarily reflect the Big Bad Blog’s opinion).

observations and opinions art, canada, funding, globe and mail, politics, polls, reporting, science, social science, stephen harper, technology

Back in University, my class was asked by our professor: “Who thinks that the penalty for sexual assault should be stiffer.”*

Most of the class raised their hand.

“Now,” said the professor, “if you know what the current prison term for sexual assault is, lower your hand.” One person did so.

The point was that — when it comes to serious crimes — our instinct is that what is out there is not enough, no matter what is out there. The death penalty is too good for them; too bad we don’t have the death penalty. And so on. As human beings, we do not take that moment to reflect on the current penalty and decide if it fits the crime. It is automatically insufficient.

Some politicians make careers from this fact alone.

For those of you who are not Canadian, you may not know the big news headlines in Canada these days: It’s Tori.

Tori — Victoria Stafford — is a child who was kidnapped, and presumably killed. Possibly sexually assaulted.

Yesterday, I noticed a friend on Facebook joining the Tori’s Law group, which states, in beautiful ALL-CAPS that BY JOINING THIS GROUP YOU PLEDGE YOUR NAME THAT YOU ARE DEMANDING CHANGE TO THE CURRENT LAWS INVOLVING CHILD OFFENDERS, YOU DEMAND HARSHER PENALTIES, WITH NO CHANCE OF PAROLE UNTIL SENTENCE IS SERVED IN FULL. Not being one to delve too deeply into the newspaper articles, I assumed that the accused in the case was previously convicted of something and had received a light sentence and/or been released early, only to re-offend.

A quick glance at The Toronto Star says otherwise:

While most describe him as intelligent and even funny, “weird” and “odd” are also common adjectives. But the thought Rafferty could be capable of kidnapping and killing a little girl never existed.

So what do harsher sentences mean? They would not have prevented this crime. And the crimes Mr. Rafferty has been accused of carry the harshest measures available in the Canadian Justice System.

The petition is pointless. There is nothing about it that would have prevented Tori’s abduction or murder. Nothing about it that would ensure the perpetrator will be more thoroughly punished. So why are there 61,000 members of the group (and counting).

Because we are outraged. And outrage is an excellent opportunity to grandstand.

If you want to make a change that counts, look to contribute (constructively) to changes to the Amber Alert system, which failed in this case.

Contribute thoughtfully. No knee-jerk reactions required.

(* I’m paraphrasing here. And now that there is a horrible pun there, I cannot reimagine the phrase.)

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