Category: Writing

Anything on the process or results of writing as an activity and a passion

The Pilot G2 lineup

Lovers of the Pilot G2 series of pens, take note: the so-called G2 ‘Pro’ version of the writing implement is only very marginally superior to the disposable model. Both are made of similar plastic, and the clicking system for retraction actually feels a bit cheaper on the $5 ‘Pro’ pen than on the $1 disposable pen. Since the ordinary version takes refills just as well as the more expensive one, there is no real reason to make the switch. In fact, the cheaper pen actually comes apart more elegantly to be resupplied with ink.

If you want a genuine step up, using the same ink cartridge system, hunt around for the metal bodied, $12 G2 Limited.

On a side note, it strikes me as odd that, while I have dramatically more expensive pens than the G2, I rarely feel comfortable carrying them around. As such, they languish in boxes in my apartment while everything from letters to to-do items on 3.5″ cards emerge from the tip of Pilot’s low-cost devices.

Manifestos on the Future of Food & Seed

This collection of essays, edited by Vandana Shiva, varies considerably in tone and degree of novelty. The manifestos themselves seem ham-fisted and loaded with unsupported assertions. It is not that no convincing case can be made for many of the arguments raised; rather, the authors simply choose not to do so. It is an approach that will win them few converts. In general, the book contains a number of positions towards which I am sympathetic: that patents on living things are highly dubious, that the present food system is unsustainable, that the agricultural policies of most states are inappropriate and often immoral. It simply manages to convey most of these points in a shrill and off-putting manner: the kind of voice that makes you take an opposing stand almost by reflex.

Most of the authors seem to profoundly misunderstand the nature of the global trade system. As with so many other blanket anti-globalization activists, they seem to think the WTO is some kind of wicked and powerful entity, enforcing its will against states. It is more accurate to say that it is an imperfect vehicle for trying to create some trade rules formulated on something other than economic and geopolitical power. It is a goal rarely achieved – how could it be? – but a worthy one nonetheless. Similarly, the WTO does not impose outside restrictions on the kind of food safety laws states can adopt. It simply requires that the same standard be applied to domestic producers as importers. You cannot reject beef produced using recombinant bovine growth hormone abroad while allowing domestic industrial agribusinesses to use the same substance. Naturally, if you are big and economically powerful, you can more or less do as you like (witness WTO rulings against American maize subsidies, for instance).

The book also seems to be a bit short of real content where genetically modified organisms and antibiotic resistance are concerned. Both naturally raise important questions of health, safety, and ethics. The nuances of the discussion, however, are poorly served by a book that asserts that the Green Revolution was actually harmful to the world’s poor. Genetically modified organisms could certainly produce adverse outcomes. At the same time, they might be able to help us reduce our dependence on toxic pesticides, reduce the carbon emissions associated with shipping and refrigeration, and deal with the consequences of climate change. Similarly, while there is much to lament about current global trade practices, the kind of protectionism advocated by most of the authors is unlikely to help either the poor or the sustainability of agriculture. What is necessary is that the total social and environmental costs of economic activities be borne by the relevant parties: not that food is grown in a particular place, domestic producers receive preferential treatment, or that the world re-fragments into disparate economies.

While the book doesn’t really make it, there is an excellent case for a global transition to new forms of agriculture. Important elements include replacing vulnerable monocultures with resilient polycultures, sharply restricting the use of antibiotics, reducing the intensity of fossil fuel use, and otherwise taking into account the many social and environmental costs of agriculture that are ignored when it is undertaken in an industrial manner. There is likewise a very strong case to be made about reforming the global intellectual property regime. It is extremely dubious to be able to patent a gene that you have moved from one creature to another. It is similarly dubious to sell seeds on a ‘licensed’ basis, where they can only be legally used for one crop.

In the end, it is hard to see who this book is for. It doesn’t contain enough substantive argumentation to convert anyone – though there is one good essay written by a local foods grocer, railing against both Walmart and Whole Foods. It likewise does not contain a viable plan for changing the nature of the global food system. Here, Michael Pollan seems to adopt the most reasonable position: accepting the popularization of organic and local food as progress, while others angrily reject them as insufficient. A book that helped to enlarge that beachhead, while providing some strategic direction towards a genuinely sustainable global food system, would have a lot more value than this short, flawed text.

Big Bang

In the past, I have praised Simon Singh for the clarity and quality of his explanations, when it comes to matters scientific and mathematical. That capacity is on display once more in Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe. The book provides a good introduction to the history of cosmology, from the ancient world to the recent past. The book covers the contributions of figures like Keppler, Copernicus, Galileo , Newton, and Einstein. It also provides good information and anecdotes on those who actually provided the data that validated the theories. The book provides a good basic description of relativity (both special and general), though those seeking a better understanding would be better served by the first half of Brian Greene’s The Elegant Universe, which contains the best explanations of relativity and quantum mechanics I have encountered.

One thing it should lay to rest is the false and pernicious belief that it was only the European crossing of the Atlantic that led to the general belief that the Earth is spherical. Not only did the ancient Greeks know this by 300 BCE, they knew the size of the planet, the size of the moon and the distance to it, and the size of the sun and distance to it. All this from trigonometry and logical reasoning, starting with Eratosthenes. It also does a good job of explaining the ways in which now discredited theories stood up to scientific scrutiny at the time. It was only with refinement that the heliocentric view of the solar system had more predictive power than Ptolemy’s geocentric model, for instance. Similarly, the debate between Big Bang and Steady State theorists could only be resolved through the improvement of both theoretical positions and empirical measurements. The book touches upon some of the key ideas of Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions, which could be an excellent thing to read as a more technical follow-up.

For me, this book lacked some of the excitement of The Code Book and Fermat’s Last Theorem, but I think this was almost entirely because I already knew most of what is in it: from Grecian planet measurement to the detection of cosmic microwave background radiation. For those less familiar with our evolving knowledge about the origin of our universe, this is an extremely clear and accessible introduction. To those unfamiliar with the origin of the stars, galaxies, and elements that make up our universe, this book is a great place to start.

Linking to relevant news

One thing that I try to do on this site is accompany posts on all topics with links to related materials: both in terms of what I have written and what is out on the wider internet. One way I do this is by leaving comments that link to and quote from relevant news stories and websites. By convention, these comments are attributed to ‘.’ since it doesn’t take long to write and cannot easily be confused with a real person.

Readers who come across relevant stuff that they simply wish to link, rather than say anything about, are encouraged to use the convention as well. If you use ‘dot@sindark.com’ in the box for the email address, your comment will have the ‘Just some news’ gravatar placed beside it.

10^5 visits

Red snowplow

Recently, this blog got its 100,000th visitor since August 2005. While such numbers don’t have much meaning in and of themselves, they do provide an opportunity to take stock and consider what has happened so far and where things are going.

Between August 2005 and July 2007, the major purpose of the site was to document the Oxford experience and stay in touch with friends and family while off in England. Since returning to Canada, it has had less of a defined purpose. There has also been a conscious decision to make it significantly less personal overall. As a result, it now mostly consists of either personal musings on impersonal topics or responses to books or news items. This is not wholly without value. It fosters interesting discussions and provides a mechanism for keeping in touch with some friends. It may also help to inform some people a bit about topics of interest or importance, such as climate change.

At the same time, there are some things that concern me. I don’t really see enormously much value in providing links to information available elsewhere, along with minimal commentary. Additionally, I worry a bit that writing drips and drabs every day could sap energy that might otherwise be put into longer-term and more ambitious projects.

With Emily here, I also have less time to spend on random musings. As such, writing a daily post is more often than not an exercise in frantically scanning the news for something that I can comment upon without overly much thought or research. One solution is to dial things back and only write when I actually have something I want to say. That removes the impetus to come up with something daily – which has advantages as well as disadvantages – but should help to keep me from boring people with items of only limited interest or creativity.

On constancy

Readers should be warned that my posting is likely to be less regular over the summer. The day-to-day expectation of one long post between 7:00am and 8:00am and a shorter post between 6:00pm and 7:00pm should be partially suspended.

I will certainly try to upload a post and a photo every day, but we shall see if that remains feasible given other ongoing projects.

Assembly line reading and writing

I remember once reading an interview with science fiction author William Gibson in which he argued that he could not keep a blog because it would sap his ability to write other things. I think he used a steam engine analogy: arguing that the minor releases of pressure associated with writing blog posts prevent him from developing the working force required for more substantial pieces of writing.

This lines up somewhat with something Nassim Nicholas Taleb said in his book. He argued that excessive focus on day-to-day and hour-to-hour news actually reduces one’s ability to understand the world. This is because it creates the spurious impression of trends when there is really only chatter; also, the time required for such constant perusal saps one’s ability to read more substantial things, like books.

While I don’t have any firm personal plans to respond to these observations, they do seem valid and indicative of a period in history where throughts are addressed in an increasingly frantic and disjointed manner.

The Black Swan

Dirty machinery

Nassim Nicholas Taleb‘s The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable is an unusual, excellent book with broad applicability. In particular, those concerned with finance or the use of mathematics in social disciplines (politics, economics, international relations, etc) should strongly consider reading it. They will probably find it uncomfortable – as it demonstrates how their ‘rigorous’ disciplines are built on sand – but they will be wiser people if they can accept that.

Taleb’s main point is that life is dominated by improbable events of huge consequence. This is obscured to us for a number of reasons: not least, because we are able to look back and construct plausible after-the-fact stories about why things turned out the way they did. Because we fail to appreciate how explosively improbable the world is, we leave ourselves far more vulnerable than our predictions suggest. Indeed, the biggest thing Taleb attacks is the very notion that we can make good predictions about the future. ‘Black Swans’ are those improbable events of massive consequence which we are able to rationalize after the fact, though we could not have predicted them before. They can be negative (the sudden collapse of a bank) or positive (the amazing success of an obscure book). They relate to the way in which the world is skewed towards extremes when it comes to things like income or the importance of a publication.

Taleb’s book consists of an odd combination of anecdote, mathematics, scholarly and literary references, personal history, and diatribes. Throughout, one has the impression of engaging in conversation with an unusually fascinating fellow – albeit one who takes special pleasure in cutting down those who disagree with him (the text ignores no opportunity for mocking and insulting economists and financial analysts, in particular).

The lessons Taleb says one should draw from an appreciation of Black Swans are noteworthy and sensible. First, we should maximize our chances of getting lucky and finding a positive Black Swan. In investment terms, that means making lots of small bets on long shots that might really pay off. In life more generally, it basically means trying new things – visiting the restaurant you never normally would, going on the blind date, seizing the opportunity to meet with the big shot publisher to explain your book idea. Second, we should minimize our exposure to negative Black Swans that can wipe us out. That means definitely avoiding standard financial instruments like mutual funds, distrusting any risk assessment based on the bell curve, and appreciating that blue-chip stocks might collapse despite decades of steady growth. His overall financial prescription is to put whatever you are unwilling to lose in US government bonds, while using the rest to make long-shot speculative bets.

It would be very interesting to see Taleb’s ideas applied directly to International Relations (the capital letters mean ‘IR the discipline’ rather than IR the phenomenon) or climate change. Within IR, there are a few dissenters who appreciate just how inappropriate all the statistics and quantitative methods being trotted out really are. They would find Taleb’s book to be confidence-boosting, whereas the number obsessed IR scholars concentrated in the United States would probably respond to it with as much anger as hedge fund managers.

When it comes to climate change, the Black Swan idea seems relevant in several ways. First, it creates a healthy scepticism about projections: whether they are for economic growth, greenhouse gas emission levels, or greenhouse gas reductions associated with certain policies. Secondly, it reveals how fallacious it is to say: “Humanity muddled through so far, therefore we can handle climate change just like any previous crisis.” Thirdly, it sheds light on scenario planning in the face of possible disastrous outcomes with unknown probabilities attached.

It is safe to say that anybody interested in how history is written or how people try to come to grips with an uncertain future will find something of value in this text. At the very least, the colourful asides provide plenty of mental fodder. At the very most, appreciation for Black Swans might significantly alter how you live your life.

Bastiat on subsidies

Meaghan Beattie in a playground

Anyone who spends time thinking about public policy might benefit from reading Frédéric Bastiat‘s final essay: “What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen,” published in 1850. Many of the sections – such as those concerning people employed by the armed forces, and those on state subsidies for the arts – are surely as valid now as 150 years ago.

Bastiat also provides a concise rebuttal of the kind of ‘job creation’ argument frequently employed by governments:

Let us get to the bottom of things. Money creates an illusion for us. To ask for co-operation, in the form of money, from all the citizens in a common enterprise is, in reality, to ask of them actual physical co-operation, for each one of them procures for himself by his labor the amount he is taxed. Now, if we were to gather together all the citizens and exact their services from them in order to have a piece of work performed that is useful to all, this would be understandable; their recompense would consist in the results of the work itself. But if, after being brought together, they were forced to build roads on which no one would travel, or palaces that no one would live in, all under the pretext of providing work for them, it would seem absurd, and they would certainly be justified in objecting: We will have none of that kind of work. We would rather work for ourselves.

That is, indeed, an excellent mental test of public worth. If we were all brought together to build a museum that will be widely admired and universally enjoyed, we will not feel cheated of our labour. If we were brought together to build some white elephant – an international airport for a tiny town, a bridge to nowhere, and anti-ballistic missile shield – we would feel duly resentful for not having employed our labour for better purposes.

The essay features a spirited defence of middlemen, which is well worth reading. The story told about rent seeking and protectionism is also admirably clear and engaging:

Mr. Protectionist was going to resign himself sadly just to being free like everyone else, when suddenly he had a brilliant idea.

He remembered that there is a great law factory in Paris. What is a law? he asked himself. It is a measure to which, when once promulgated, whether it is good or bad, everyone has to conform. For the execution of this law, a public police force is organized, and to make up the said public police force, men and money are taken from the nation.

If, then, I manage to get from that great Parisian factory a nice little law saying: “Belgian iron is prohibited,” I shall attain the following results: The government will replace the few servants that I wanted to send to the frontier with twenty thousand sons of my recalcitrant metalworkers, locksmiths, nailmakers, blacksmiths, artisans, mechanics, and plowmen. Then, to keep these twenty thousand customs officers in good spirits and health, there will be distributed to them twenty-five million francs taken from these same blacksmiths, nailmakers, artisans, and plowmen. Organized in this way, the protection will be better accomplished; it will cost me nothing; I shall not be exposed to the brutality of brokers; I shall sell the iron at my price; and I shall enjoy the sweet pleasure of seeing our great people shamefully hoaxed.

It is a point especially well made as the American electoral season continues to encourage less and less sensible statements from leading candidates, when it comes to trade.