It’s never going to end…

I’m the executor for my late mother’s estate. Last week I thought I had completed all of my duties. I had liquidated all of my mother’s assets over the course of the past year, and then the final step was calculating the distribution of money, which was reviewed by our lawyer; that final summary was sent to all of the heirs, giving them an opportunity to dispute anything, and they then signed a form and sent it back to the lawyer. I wrote a whole bunch of checks and sent those to the lawyer.

Yesterday was the day the lawyer had received all of the signatures, all dutifully signed, had all of the pre-signed checks, and was going to pop them in the mail, and we’d be all done.

And then…another bill from an insurance company for my mother’s last days in the hospital arrived, for unspecified in-patient treatments, for $770. This was a year ago! The lawyer had posted a public notice last year telling all creditors that this was their last chance to get their final bite of the pie. It took a year to complete the accounting because these bills and claims had trickled in for months.

We thought we were clear. There was a 4 month cut off on claims, but it turns out there’s a medical exemption.

So today I get to recalculate everything with new final sum and rewrite all of those checks and send them to the lawyer. Oh boy.

You’ll never guess who the belated bill that messed up the completion of this chore came from: United Healthcare.

We traded cancer research for a fancy new paint job

The US gutted research institution this year — so far, it has cost us $3.8 billion. What a savings! What shall we do with all that money instead?

How about repainting the border wall? (Which, according to the Cato Institute of all places, doesn’t work.)

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Tuesday that the entire border wall along the southern border with Mexico is going to be painted black to make it hotter and deter illegal immigration — and she credited President Trump with the idea.

Noem spoke during a visit to a portion of the wall in New Mexico, where she also picked up a roller brush to help out with the painting.

She touted the height of the wall as well as the depth as ways to deter people seeking to go over or under the walls. And then Noem said Homeland Security was going to be trying black paint to make the metal hotter.

“That is specifically at the request of the president, who understands that in the hot temperatures down here when something is painted black it gets even warmer and it will make it even harder for people to climb. So we are going to be painting the entire southern border wall black to make sure that we encourage individuals to not come into our country illegally,” Noem said.

The cost for this brilliant redesign is “between $500 million and $3 billion”, or somewhat more than Kristi Noem’s plastic surgery bill. Try not to think about how many research grants that sum could have funded.

Monarchs like our house

Mary has planted lots of milkweed in our yard, and it’s paying off. We keep finding more caterpillars, and we’ve seen as many as a half-dozen butterflies at once fluttering over the tasty field of monarch food growing here.

It’s nothing compared to the swarms we’d see 20-25 years ago, but we’re doing our part to cultivate more.

Sure, go ask Google

Google is pushing hard to get us to use AI for all kinds of things. We should just ask Google our questions about biology!

After all, I, as a biologist have so much confidence in the power of AI to address difficult questions about biology. For instance, ask it to explain an ovarian cyst to you.

(I’ve put this image below the fold to avoid triggering nightmares or confusion.)

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Complacency will not defeat stupidity

Dietrich Bonhoeffer saw the problem clearly in the 1940s. It’s the stupidity, stupid, and stupidity is more subtle and complex than you might think. Keep the MAGA movement in mind while reading this.

Stupidity is a more dangerous enemy of the good than malice. One may protest against evil; it can be exposed and, if need be, prevented by use of force. Evil always carries within itself the germ of its own subversion in that it leaves behind in human beings at least a sense of unease. Against stupidity we are defenseless. Neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything here; reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict one’s prejudgment simply need not be believed- in such moments the stupid person even becomes critical – and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental. In all this the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self-satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack. For that reason, greater caution is called for than with a malicious one. Never again will we try to persuade the stupid person with reasons, for it is senseless and dangerous.

If we want to know how to get the better of stupidity, we must seek to understand its nature. This much is certain, that it is in essence not an intellectual defect but a human one. There are human beings who are of remarkably agile intellect yet stupid, and others who are intellectually quite dull yet anything but stupid. We discover this to our surprise in particular situations. The impression one gains is not so much that stupidity is a congenital defect, but that, under certain circumstances, people are made stupid or that they allow this to happen to them. We note further that people who have isolated themselves from others or who live in solitude manifest this defect less frequently than individuals or groups of people inclined or condemned to sociability. And so it would seem that stupidity is perhaps less a psychological than a sociological problem. It is a particular form of the impact of historical circumstances on human beings, a psychological concomitant of certain external conditions. Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or of a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity. It would even seem that this is virtually a sociological-psychological law. The power of the one needs the stupidity of the other. The process at work here is not that particular human capacities, for instance, the intellect, suddenly atrophy or fail. Instead, it seems that under the overwhelming impact of rising power, humans are deprived of their inner independence, and, more or less consciously, give up establishing an autonomous position toward the emerging circumstances. The fact that the stupid person is often stubborn must not blind us to the fact that he is not independent. In conversation with him, one virtually feels that one is dealing not at all with a person, but with slogans, catchwords and the like that have taken possession of him. He is under a spell, blinded, misused, and abused in his very being. Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also be capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings.

Yet at this very point it becomes quite clear that only an act of liberation, not instruction, can overcome stupidity. Here we must come to terms with the fact that in most cases a genuine internal liberation becomes possible only when external liberation has preceded it. Until then we must abandon all attempts to convince the stupid person. This state of affairs explains why in such circumstances our attempts to know what ‘the people’ really think are in vain and why, under these circumstances, this question is so irrelevant for the person who is thinking and acting responsibly. The word of the Bible that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom declares that the internal liberation of human beings to live the responsible life before God is the only genuine way to overcome stupidity.

But these thoughts about stupidity also offer consolation in that they utterly forbid us to consider the majority of people to be stupid in every circumstance. It really will depend on whether those in power expect more from people’s stupidity than from their inner independence and wisdom.

That describes our current situation perfectly. We have a mob of people who have been incentivized to be stupid — unquestioning, dogmatic, full of certainty, and motivated to rationalize every stupid decision by those in power. Reason and evidence will not dissuade them; those are the tools we always considered the best of our civilized minds, and they’ve completely negated them. Stupidity is the secret weapon underlying fascism.

It’s an effective weapon. Here’s a depressing analysis that says, historically, “Once fascists win power democratically, they have never been removed democratically. Not once. Ever.”

The pattern is so consistent it’s almost funny if it weren’t so terrifying. Every single time it goes like this: Conservatives panic about socialism or progressives or whatever. They ally with fascists as the “lesser evil.” Fascists take power. Fascists immediately purge the conservatives who helped them. Then it’s 30-50 years of dictatorship. This happened in Germany, Italy, Spain, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Greece, Portugal, Croatia, Romania, and Hungary.

Want to know how many times conservatives successfully “controlled” the fascists they allied with? Zero. Want to know how many times fascists purged the conservatives after taking power? All of them. Every single time.

Now consider this: the United States has been taken over by fascist. It is a fascist state, and we don’t even have an effective resistance — the Democratic party is a floundering joke, led by people who are more interested in maintaining their petty powers than in defeating an existential threat. Sure, do write a “strongly worded letter” and give the fascists a good chuckle.

And here’s the part that breaks your heart. Violence works. For them. Fascists use violence while claiming to be victims. They create chaos that “requires” their authoritarian solution. Then they purge anyone who opposes them. Meanwhile, democrats keep insisting on following rules that fascists completely ignore. They file lawsuits. They write editorials. They vote on resolutions. And fascists just laugh and keep consolidating power.

The statistics are brutal. Fascist takeovers prevented after winning power democratically: zero. Average length of fascist rule once established: 31 years. Fascist regimes removed by voting: zero. Fascist regimes removed by asking nicely: zero. Most were removed by war or military coups, and tens of millions died in the process.

Wow. So pessimistic. Also, so realistic. No matter what, it’s going to take a struggle (maybe a futile one, but better that than to accept the coming tyranny) to defeat fascism. Our current leadership lacks the will to fight — as one example look at the packed, corrupt Supreme Court which could have been weakened during the Biden administration…and nothing was done. The Republicans have been building and strengthening oppressive institutions, but imagine, if the Democrats won the next election, would they, for instance, disband ICE? You know they wouldn’t: they’d compromise, at a time when we need decisive ruthlessness.

The only hints of optimism I’m seeing are from Refuse Fascism — they seem to believe that we can actually fight back and take back the country. I agree with Bonhoeffer that argument and debate are not winning tactics against stupidity. What we need is a strong shock to awaken the citizenry and jar them out of their cultivated dogma, and a mass uprising is the only thing we can do at this point to do that. There is a planned march on occupied Washington DC to protest on 5 November, we should all go.

You might want to tune in to the Refuse Fascism podcast to hear from voices that are simultaneously fully aware of how dire our situation is while also believing that mass action might actually help us overcome the current fascist regime. Check it out. If nothing else, Sunsara Taylor gives an invigorating speech in the first five minutes.

We have to get out of the mindset that we can patch it up in the next election.

I thought I was going to miss out this year

The peak season for Argiope is late summer, and I’ve been physically wrecked for all of August, so I’d resigned myself to not seeing any of these big beautiful spiders this year. Then Mary went out to the garden to pick tomatoes, and there, right there in my back yard, is Argiope aurantia nestled down in our rather weedy crop!

Strictly speaking, I haven’t actually seen one yet — Mary took an iPhone photo of one. It’s 5 or 6 meters from my back door, which is out of my current range, but I can aspire to hobble out there sometime in the next few days, I think. It gives me something to aim for, anyway.

An exciting Friday morning!

I got to go outside! Actually, I had to go outside, since I have a ravenous population of spiders in my lab that must be fed, or there will be consequences. The one problem is that I’m still stuck in a wheelchair, which turned out to be almost no problem at all. The only steps I had to deal with were 3 short steps just outside my back door, and the rest of the way was all ramps, all the way to the science building elevator. Then, of course, I had my assistant Mary to push me there and back.

Actual photo of Mary helping me navigate the science building this morning.

The only real problem was that, as always it seems, we had another major thunderstorm roll through, with skies dark as night and thunder and lightning and a drenching rain. I think it’s fine that my return to the lab would be heralded with spooky nightmare weather.

Now the spiders are all snug in their webs, happily crunching through mealworms and flies, and all is right in the world.

Slimy underbelly #2: Jillian Michaels

On an episode of “CNN NewsNight with Abby Philip,” the topic being discussed was a serious one: the Trump administration’s current program to purge the Smithsonian, and other museums, of exhibits that painted white Americans in an unflattering light. In particular, this meant that exhibits about the horrors of slavery were going to be censored, and were going to misrepresent a significant chunk of our history.

CNN, a cable news network, in a news program, brought on a round table of about 5 people and the host, Abby Phillip, to discuss this issue. One of the participants, Jillian Michaels, came prepared with a long list of exhibits that, she claimed, had the theme of “white people bad” (that’s actually how she phrased it — I rather suspect that no professional museum exhibit said such a thing. I’d also like to know who gave her that list…the Heritage Foundation? The Ku Klux Klan?)

Michaels charged into the discussion, waved her list around, and declared that no, Trump was only trying to balance the presentation of slavery.

In a roundtable discussion about President Donald Trump’s latest plan, some on the panel accused him of attempting to whitewash history, including downplaying the horrors of slavery. But Michaels pushed back, arguing that some of exhibits in question unfairly target white people.

He’s not whitewashing slavery, she said. And you cannot tie imperialism and racism and slavery to just one race, which is pretty much what every single exhibit does.

Michaels then went on to try to justify her argument by saying that slavery is thousands of years old and that only a small percentage of white Americans actually owned slaves, something host Abby Phillip did not seem to appreciate.

They were discussing the history of American slavery, which was pretty much a white-owned institution. Any museum exhibit is going to show white people benefiting from exploitation of an almost entirely black population. How can you hide that without grossly distorting the facts?

She also tried to claim that only 2% of American individuals owned slaves, a number you can get by including the more populous northern states, where it was outlawed, including the black population of the enslaved, discounting the fact that a whole family dependent on slavery only counted one person, the master, and yeah, let’s ignore the economic dependencies of the Southern states. More accurate and historically conscious analyses reveal a different number.

So, according to the Census of 1860, 30.8 percent of the free families in the confederacy owned slaves.
That means that every third white person in those states had a direct commitment to slavery.

OK, so who the heck is Jillian Michaels, and why was she brought into this serious discussion?

She was a reality TV star.

She was a coach brought on to a show called “The Biggest Loser” where she yelled at fat people to eat less and exercise more. She has zero expertise in history, museum curation, or treating people humanely. Her qualification for getting on the show were that she is extremely opinionated and conservative — that is, that she has a loud mouth and is stupid. She has no qualifications. She runs a blog and a podcast (because everyone has a podcast) where she peddles “supplements” and yammers about how much she hates DEI and immigrants and “wokism”.

What were the producers at CNN thinking? They definitely weren’t looking for informed, educated opinion on a complex issue. They just went with a pushy, random, white ignoramus who’d spout off controversial (and wrong) ideas.

And so the bad ideas continue to spread, thanks to media that doesn’t believe in informing, but only in keeping the paying public’s eyes glued to their ads.

Avi Loeb loses a soccer match

Tragic. Avi Loeb lost the annual soccer match at his institution!

Last night, we held the annual soccer cup match between the faculty and the students at Harvard’s Institute for Theory & Computation, for which I serve as director. Although I scored 2 goals for the faculty team, the students won 3 to 2. Disappointed by the outcome, I focused on 3I/ATLAS as soon as I woke up the following morning.

On the bright side, it gave him an excuse to remind everyone that he was the director, and to mention that he scored the only two goals on his side. Apparently, no one has told him that these kinds of games are just for fun, that it’s bad taste to focus on the score, and that no one else was trying to “win”. He was disconsolate at “losing,” though, and when he woke up the next morning he decided to cheer himself up by contorting some data to make it fit his idea that 3I/ATLAS was a nuclear-powered starship.

He does a lot of math, and determines that

IF 3I/ATLAS is much smaller than the estimates
THEN it must have an internal light source to get the brightness we observe

Rather than considering that his initial premise could be wrong, he invents some other hypothetical mechanisms.

I first calculated that a primordial black hole with a Hawking temperature of 1,000 degrees Kelvin would produce only 20 nanowatts of power, clearly insufficient to power 3I/ATLAS. A natural nuclear source could be a rare fragment from the core of a nearby supernova that is rich in radioactive material. This possibility is highly unlikely, given the scarce reservoir of radioactive elements in interstellar space.

Wait…why assume an interstellar rock needs a certain amount of power? Never mind, those were explanations he threw out and discarded so we would favor his preferred hypothesis.

Alternatively, 3I/ATLAS could be a spacecraft powered by nuclear energy, and the dust emitted from its frontal surface might be from dirt that accumulated on its surface during its interstellar travel. This cannot be ruled out, but requires better evidence to be viable.

Then he nicely asked NASA to redirect their instruments near Mars and Jupiter to focus on his hypothetical nuclear powered spacecraft. And also contacted the NY Post to write about his sensational discovery.

The man is such a ridiculous glory-hog.