I see the mythical kingdom (or, more likely, People's Democratic Republic) of Bongo Bongo Land is back in the news. Those of us with longish memories will recall that the ineffable Alan Clark got into a spot of bother for using this phrase, and claimed in his defence that he was simply referring to the then President of Gabon, Omar Bongo. Bongo, a noted kleptocrat, ruled his country for 41 years, using its wealth to bankroll himself, his family and any French political parties needing to make secret payments for one thing or another. Since his death in 2009, Gabon has been ruled by Omar's son, Ali Bongo, who by chance shares his name with a noted comedy magician, aka 'The Shriek of Araby'.
The 'Bongo Bongo Land' phrase has been revived by one Godfrey Bloom, an MEP in the UKIP interest, who clearly reached for his Bongos to describe a representative African kleptocracy where the nation's wealth is spent very much in the Omar Bongo manner (though perhaps without bankrolling French political slush funds). Bloom made a hilariously unrepentant appearance on the Today programme this morning, where poor Jim Naughtie seemed too flabbergasted to ask any pertinent questions, and ended up eliciting Bloom's views on foreign aid rather than, as one might have expected, labouring the point that the BBL phrase might be seen as 'racist' or at least derogatory. Never mind, there are plenty of others queuing up to do that.
Meanwhile, the juice drink Um Bongo ('Um Bongo, Um Bongo, they drink it in the Congo') goes on its merry way, apparently without causing any offence. For some reason (a shared African colonial past perhaps), it sells particularly well in Portugal - 'Um Bongo, o bom sabor da selva'. Indeed.
Wednesday, 7 August 2013
Dabbler alert
My brief review of a brief novel - Janet Lewis's The Wife of Martin Guerre - is over on The Dabbler today.
Tuesday, 6 August 2013
The Discreet Charm of Scientism
On the train this morning I noticed an unprepossessing young(ish) man, somewhat on the large and lardy side, wearing a belligerent expression and a most unfortunate attempt at a haircut. What he was also wearing - and the reason I noticed him - was a T-shirt that bore, in large block capitals, the word 'SCIENCE' and, underneath, the legend 'It works, bitches.'
I assume the comma in that is not doing the work of an 'and', as in American headlines (The Onion on Clinton's accession: 'New President feels nation's pain, breasts'). It works and bitches? No, it would appear this unhappy fellow was assuming that those around him were inclined to deny that science works and were therefore 'bitches'. Yet another touching example of the discreet charm of scientism.
It's hardly worth arguing the point, but religion too 'works' - and has been shown to do so (in terms of mental health and various good outcomes) by what can only be called 'scientific' research. However, I don't feel inclined to wear a T-shirt pointing out the fact. 'RELIGION. It works, chums'? Hardly.
I assume the comma in that is not doing the work of an 'and', as in American headlines (The Onion on Clinton's accession: 'New President feels nation's pain, breasts'). It works and bitches? No, it would appear this unhappy fellow was assuming that those around him were inclined to deny that science works and were therefore 'bitches'. Yet another touching example of the discreet charm of scientism.
It's hardly worth arguing the point, but religion too 'works' - and has been shown to do so (in terms of mental health and various good outcomes) by what can only be called 'scientific' research. However, I don't feel inclined to wear a T-shirt pointing out the fact. 'RELIGION. It works, chums'? Hardly.
Monday, 5 August 2013
Chicken Sexing: An Unsung Art
As I read today's lively exchanges on The Dabbler on the subject of chickens, my mind naturally turned to that vital yet strangely unsung art - chicken sexing. Vital, that is, to poultry production and, especially, egg production. For hatchling chicks adjudged by the skilled chicken sexer to be male and therefore not required for egg production, the outlook is grim indeed (and very short). This is a fact worth mentioning to egg-eating vegetarians who imagine that their dietary choice is saving vast numbers of animals from needless death (as is the sad fate of male calves in a system geared to producing vast quantities of the cows' milk enjoyed by lactovegetarians). The Wikipedia entry on Chicken Sexing is not for the faint-hearted. The paragraph on Vent Sexing is especially harrowing... ('Many professional vent sexers are Japanese...' I wonder how they get on at drinks parties: 'So what's your line of business, Tojo?')
If anyone can shed further light on the place of the 'example of the chicken sexers' in the internalism/externalism debate in epistemology [see Trivia], I'd be delighted to hear from them.
If anyone can shed further light on the place of the 'example of the chicken sexers' in the internalism/externalism debate in epistemology [see Trivia], I'd be delighted to hear from them.
Butterfly Bonanza
Like the rest of the world, I'm sure, I am still struggling to digest the full implications of the earth-shattering, epoch-defining news - as announced in a typically understated 30-minute special by the BBC last night - that another actor is to take over the lead role in Doctor Who. When I feel able to, I shall post my considered response to this development...
Meanwhile, this glorious Butterfly Summer goes on giving. On a routine walk to and from the shops on Saturday morning - when it was not spectacularly sunny or hot, and I was making no particular butterfly-spotting effort - I saw a Peacock, a Red Admiral, two Commas, a Common Blue, three Painted Ladies and a Speckled Wood, as well as innumerable Whites (Small and Large) and Gatekeepers, and two Jersey Tigers (day-flying moths, quite easily mistaken, in flight, for Painted Ladies). A Sunday morning walk a little further afield added Green-Veined White, Meadow Brown, Small Skipper and Ringlet to the list. It's been years since I saw that many species, all at once, so close to home - but what is most wonderful about this summer is the sheer abundance, the prodigious numbers of individuals flying. You can't walk many yards without one or more flying into - or out of - view, starting up from the ground or a nearby leaf, or even (as happened to me yesterday with a Red Admiral) settling on your clothes. It takes me back to the long ago summers of my boyhood...
This year's abundance of butterfly life demonstrates the simple fact that butterflies (or nearly all of them) require warm/hot, dry and sunny weather if they are to thrive. The recent decline of most of our species surely has far more to do with the dismal run of harsh winters and cool wet summers than anything else. If the warmists' predictions has turned out to be accurate and we were indeed to be in for reliably mild winters and scorching summers, it would have been very good news for our sun-starved butterflies.
Meanwhile, this glorious Butterfly Summer goes on giving. On a routine walk to and from the shops on Saturday morning - when it was not spectacularly sunny or hot, and I was making no particular butterfly-spotting effort - I saw a Peacock, a Red Admiral, two Commas, a Common Blue, three Painted Ladies and a Speckled Wood, as well as innumerable Whites (Small and Large) and Gatekeepers, and two Jersey Tigers (day-flying moths, quite easily mistaken, in flight, for Painted Ladies). A Sunday morning walk a little further afield added Green-Veined White, Meadow Brown, Small Skipper and Ringlet to the list. It's been years since I saw that many species, all at once, so close to home - but what is most wonderful about this summer is the sheer abundance, the prodigious numbers of individuals flying. You can't walk many yards without one or more flying into - or out of - view, starting up from the ground or a nearby leaf, or even (as happened to me yesterday with a Red Admiral) settling on your clothes. It takes me back to the long ago summers of my boyhood...
This year's abundance of butterfly life demonstrates the simple fact that butterflies (or nearly all of them) require warm/hot, dry and sunny weather if they are to thrive. The recent decline of most of our species surely has far more to do with the dismal run of harsh winters and cool wet summers than anything else. If the warmists' predictions has turned out to be accurate and we were indeed to be in for reliably mild winters and scorching summers, it would have been very good news for our sun-starved butterflies.
Thursday, 1 August 2013
Morley and Mee
A strange and rather wonderful thing happened on Radio 4 this week. I found myself listening to the Book at Bedtime and enjoying it! What's more, it's a new title - a novel by Ian Sansom (whom I'd never heard of) called The Norfolk Mystery. At first I took it to be a deft, well written and very amusing period comedy (it's set in 1937) - but now it turns out to be a murder mystery (I guess the clue was in the title) and I'm rather disappointed, being no fan of the whodunit. However, I shall definitely keep listening - it's on through next week too...
The Norfolk Mystery begins with one Stephen Sefton newly returned, thoroughly disillusioned and fed up, from the Spanish Civil War, and finding himself stony broke and at a loose end. Answering a strangely worded ad in a newspaper, he finds himself taken on as amanuensis by 'Professor' Swanton Morley, an omnivorous intellect, indefatigable writing machine and all-round powerhouse, who has spent his life turning out works of popular education and patriotic uplift in phenomenal quantities. He is now embarking on a history of traditional England in the form of a series of books about the counties. Beginning with Norfolk - and The Norfolk Mystery is to be the first of a series of mysteries titled The County Guides. Thirty-nine more to come? Why not?
Here is Ian Sansom's sales pitch for The Norfolk Mystery:
'I have written another book.
Like all of my other books it probably won’t be stocked in your local Waterstones.
There will be no reviews. You will not find it in airports.
I will not be interviewed by Mark Lawson or Mariella Frostrup.
I will not be attending literary festivals. Or giving readings.
There is no Facebook page. And I'm too tired to tweet.
Basically, frankly - I'll be totally honest - there is no publicity.
For what it's worth, here's my pitch: it's a good book. You might like it.'
I like the cut of his jib...
The inspiration for Swanton Morley is surely the phenomenally productive Arthur Mee, who, like Morley, embarked on a series of county guides, under the title The King's England (they're still around, often turning up in second-hand bookhops). Mee described this project as 'the first census of the ancient and beautiful and curious historic possessions of England since the motor car came to make it possible...' Among his other products were two hefty anthologies which I remember having around the house in my boyhood - Arthur Mee's Book of Everlasting Things and Arthur Mee's Book of One Thousand Beautiful Things, both illustrated, as I recall, with plates that showed a marked predilection for 18th-century portraits (English and French school).
But enough of that. The Norfolk Mystery may be a whodunit but 'it's a good book. You might like it.'
The Norfolk Mystery begins with one Stephen Sefton newly returned, thoroughly disillusioned and fed up, from the Spanish Civil War, and finding himself stony broke and at a loose end. Answering a strangely worded ad in a newspaper, he finds himself taken on as amanuensis by 'Professor' Swanton Morley, an omnivorous intellect, indefatigable writing machine and all-round powerhouse, who has spent his life turning out works of popular education and patriotic uplift in phenomenal quantities. He is now embarking on a history of traditional England in the form of a series of books about the counties. Beginning with Norfolk - and The Norfolk Mystery is to be the first of a series of mysteries titled The County Guides. Thirty-nine more to come? Why not?
Here is Ian Sansom's sales pitch for The Norfolk Mystery:
'I have written another book.
Like all of my other books it probably won’t be stocked in your local Waterstones.
There will be no reviews. You will not find it in airports.
I will not be interviewed by Mark Lawson or Mariella Frostrup.
I will not be attending literary festivals. Or giving readings.
There is no Facebook page. And I'm too tired to tweet.
Basically, frankly - I'll be totally honest - there is no publicity.
For what it's worth, here's my pitch: it's a good book. You might like it.'
I like the cut of his jib...
The inspiration for Swanton Morley is surely the phenomenally productive Arthur Mee, who, like Morley, embarked on a series of county guides, under the title The King's England (they're still around, often turning up in second-hand bookhops). Mee described this project as 'the first census of the ancient and beautiful and curious historic possessions of England since the motor car came to make it possible...' Among his other products were two hefty anthologies which I remember having around the house in my boyhood - Arthur Mee's Book of Everlasting Things and Arthur Mee's Book of One Thousand Beautiful Things, both illustrated, as I recall, with plates that showed a marked predilection for 18th-century portraits (English and French school).
But enough of that. The Norfolk Mystery may be a whodunit but 'it's a good book. You might like it.'
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