Farewell little friend

As well as our resident two dogs and a cat, we have many non-human visitors to our home and some are from my point of view, more welcome than others. My wife's caring and compassionate attitude to all creatures great and small, is to be commended and as an example, when we discovered a massive hornets nest in the loft last year, she was insistent it was removed without harming the hornets, which we managed to do. I did, however, have to wait until the winter months when the insects were no longer active!

Other creatures that have literally become part of our home are the geckos. These reptiles are part of the lizard family and the ones that co-inhabit our residence are mediterranean house geckos. They are frequent visitors and the picture is of one in our living room that is eyeing up a tasty morsel! Unfortunately some are not so lucky, which leads me into my main story.

In the region where we live in Turkey, the summers are long and hot. For several months the temperatures are in the mid 30s and can exceed 40 degrees C. So air conditioning is highly desirable. The winter temperatures, whilst somewhat higher than central and northern Europe, can nevertheless be in single figures particularly at night. So the air conditioners are often used 'in reverse' to provide room heating. A couple of weeks ago when I found it necessary to warm the bedroom, I was disappointed to discover the air conditioner didn't work. I contacted the local service centre who promptly sent a technician to our home. He diagnosed the problem to be a faulty fan motor and later returned with a new unit. He connected it up, only to find it wasn't the solution to the problem. He then decided it must be the control card, a sub unit that takes in the mains power, as well as the command signals from the remote controller, and generates all the necessary outputs to the heating and cooling units. He returned a couple of days later with a new control card, installed it and we now have a working air conditioner. But what was interesting and sad was why the old card had given up the ghost. When the technician removed the old card he noticed that part of it was badly burnt and connecting two contacts that shouldn't be connected, was a stiff and lifeless gecko!

My wife's reaction to the incident was predictable. She felt very sorry for the gecko. I have to admit that my own immediate reaction was less compassionate as I was presented with the financial consequences of the gecko's action - a bill for 140 Turkish Lira. Upon reflection, however, I do believe the tragedy might have been avoided as I will now explain. There are two parts to an air conditioner, one inside the house and the other mounted externally. Between the two units there is a hole in the wall for the interconnecting cables and pipes. The technician pointed out to me that the geckos were using the hole as the entry point to our home, via the internal unit. I have since siliconed the holes for the unit that was repaired and the other units in our property so hopefully the geckos' hazardous entry points have been blocked, although I am sure they will find other ways in, which hopefully will be less risky.

So farewell little friend, you will not be remembered as a martyr but your tragic end has perhaps removed one man-made risk to your species' future survival in our home.

Beyond Borders

"Nature (and that includes us) is not made of parts within wholes. It is made up of wholes within wholes. All boundaries, national boundaries included, are fundamentally arbitrary. We invent them and then, ironically, we find ourselves trapped within them."

These are the profound words of Peter Senge, founder and director of the Society for Organisational Learning and a senior lecturer at MIT. Here's another pearl of wisdom:

"When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world."

That came from John Muir, the naturalist. The point I wish to extract from these two quotes is that we live in a world of interconnections and interdependencies. It's nice to think we can break down problems into small chunks and deal with them individually but it doesn't always work. And yet it feels natural to think in 'straight lines' of cause - effect - cause - effect - ........ It's called linear thinking. Whereas in reality things tend to happen in circles rather than linearly. In short we live in a non-linear world where the results of well-intended actions, although seemingly successful at the time, can come back to bite us!

To make things more difficult for ourselves, we add constraints in the form of man-made boundaries. These occur in every aspect of life, the obvious one being territorial. But religion, race, politics, personal mindsets, organisations........ are all subject to artificial boundaries. There are always conflicts on this planet and at the time of writing these include, Israel/Palestine, Egypt, Syria, the economies of the Euro zone, UK and US, rising levels of poverty, ........ to name but a few. On each of these issues, so called 'experts' appear on the media and announce quick-fix solutions. Let's take as an example the UK economy and I will try not to portray myself as a quick-fix expert! The Chancellor's (not very) quick- fix solution to the country's malaise is 'austerity'. Drive down the debt by increased taxation and reduced public expenditure and if that doesn't work blame factors beyond your control! But the factors beyond the Chancellor's control are a fundamental and integral part or the UK's fiscal problem. So by trying to separate the UK as a 'chunk' and dealing with its income and expenditure in isolation, is tackling the symptom of the problem rather than the fundamental problem.

There are those who would go further with the 'chunk theory' and separate the UK from the rest of the world, starting by severing the link with Europe. As well as those who would separate Scotland from the UK. But why stop there? Most of the UK's wealth is generated in the south east of England so perhaps the citizens of the home counties should be pushing for independence!

I would suggest the logic for such reductionist thinking is flawed. We need to think beyond the boundaries we have created and succeeded in trapping ourselves. Despite numerous man-made boundaries, we are ONE species, homo sapien. Our ingenuity, compared with other species on the planet, has been unrivalled. Bur our naivety, in terms of survivability, is scary. To believe in perpetual growth on a finite planet, one must be mad or an economist! That is what we are doing and continue to do. What's more, through the creation of artificial divisions within our species, some parts of the planet have benefited from growth, whilst other parts haven't. The developing (another word for 'poor') part of the world now, unsurprisingly, wants to catch up. But this can only happen if the developed (another word for 'rich') part of the world gives something up because the world's resources are limited and some commodities, like fossil fuels, are fast running out. In my humble opinion, that is the fundamental problem facing the planet and other 'parochial' problems are symptoms of this underlying malaise.

So we need to think beyond borders, which means remembering we are but one species as part of many, co-existing on one planet. We need to think about DEVELOPMENT, which means getting better, rather than GROWTH, which means getting bigger, because the latter is unsustainable. If we agree with the previous two sentences then traditional boundaries - territorial, religious, racial, and so on - become less relevant and therefore more manageable.

This blog isn't going to change the world but I am convinced radical change will happen although regrettably it will probably take a few more disasters - climatic, political, economic, social - before common sense will prevail. Sad isn't it?!

THEY SAY........

I have met many THEY SAYers from different walks of life - relatives, friends, social acquaintances, business associates, broadcasters, newspapers - in fact a THEY SAYer can be any conveyor of knowledge. Here are some examples from the THEY SAYers' knowledge base:

* THEY SAY the winters will get colder and the summers will get hotter.

* THEY SAY tsunamis and earthquakes will become more frequent.

* THEY SAY eating carrots helps you see in the dark.

* THEY SAY you should eat five vegetables a day to keep fit and healthy.

* THEY SAY alternative treatments such as special diets, herbal potions and faith healing can cure apparently terminal illness.

* THEY SAY (or rather SAID thirty years ago) North Sea oil would run out within thirty years........and it didn't!

The examples are endless and the last example of thirty years ago is when I started following and getting thoroughly pxxxxd off with THEY SAYers! The punch lines are usually employed to support an argument, so a mother trying to encourage her child to eat his carrots might quote the benefit of being able to see in the dark. As the child gets older and plucks up courage to challenge his mother, perhaps by asking "Who are THEY?", a typical response is "It's a well known fact!".

Well who the fxxk are THEY? A very good question! Newspapers can be a source of THEY particularly the 'popular press' that creates news rather than just reporting it. TV all-day news programmes often flash up one-liners between programmes to whet the appetite with headlines such as "Researchers believe that drinking alcohol in moderation can reduce the risk of heart disease" or conversely, "Studies show a strong link between alcohol consumption and cancer".

As I grow older, I like to think I am getting wiser. In my view wisdom includes looking at things objectively. Purists would say that's impossible because any opinion, by definition, is subjective. OK, we'll my response to the purist is that we should form opinions on as much evidence as possible, rather like a court of law does before arriving at a verdict. So when a THEY SAYer fires a shot across your bow, the counter attack could be "Where's the evidence?". If the evidence is "I read it in the newspaper" or "I saw it on TV", well sorry but that's not good enough. Francis Bacon said "It is the peculiar and perpetual error of the human understanding to be more moved and excited by affirmatives than negatives." In other words, we believe what we want to believe and we have a tendency to find evidence that supports our pet theories. So if the THEY SAYers' 'evidence' cannot be supported by well documented and validated research programmes then it should be dismissed out of court! Maybe the mother's statement to the child who won't eat his carrots should be "There are those who believe eating carrots can improve night vision but I know of no reputable evidence to support this theory". The trouble is that such a statement is unlikely to affect the child's dislike of the taste of carrots, so if mum doesn't want the child to grow up into a faddy eater, maybe a better tactic is "Take it or leave it, there's nothing else on offer!".

Well as I write, the sun is setting and THEY SAY a blog written in daylight hours attracts a greater readership than dusk-to-dawn material........BULLSHIT!

In all probability........

We live in a world of information overload. Sorting out the wheat from the chaff is never easy particularly when so many of the 'facts' cannot be specified precisely. It is often difficult to make judgements from any set of data but when the information is known to be imprecise, drawing conclusions can be fraught with problems. Let's take the world of statistics and probabilities, starting with the former.

Benjamin Disraeli is attributed by many to have originated the phrase: "There are lies, damned lies, and statistics". Well perhaps before before exploring this statement further, it is worth drawing the distinction between statistics and probabilities. Statistics are numbers that represent facts and as such, deal with certainties, as long as good counting methods are employed. Probabilities, on the other hand, deal with the unknown. So Disraeli's statement is false if the implication is that statistics are a higher form of untruths than 'damned lies'. It is the misuse of statistics, very often linked with probabilities, that can result, intentionally or unintentionally, in something worse than 'damned lies'.

If the residents of a town, who are aged ten or over, are asked to report to a medical centre to have their heights and weights measured, then these measurements can be compared with the criteria for obesity and a statistic of the obesity of the population can be assessed. Let's assume the result was 34% of the population aged ten or over were, at the time the measurements were taken, technically obese. That measurement of 34% is a statistic. Now, if a government bureaucrat decides to use that statistic for other means, for example assessing the probability of obesity in the nation as a whole and publishes a statement to the effect: "it is likely that one in three of the nation's inhabitants over the age of ten, is obese", then the 34% is now a probability rather than a statistic. It would only become a statistic if it was supported by measurements taken of the entire nation's population. An assessment of probability based on the results of one town can be very misleading if the sample that was measured was not truly representative of the country as a whole.

One of the websites that I use for local weather forecasts, provides 'probability of precipitation' information, which is another way of saying the likelihood of rain. There is no indication of how that figure has been computed but there is likely to be a computer algorithm that might use current and historic data to assess the likelihood of rain. Note the last sentence used the words 'likely to be' and 'might use'; that sentence, therefore, has a probability of being correct and likewise a probability of being incorrect - just what can you believe these days?! Returning to the weather forecast, if the probability of rain is 70%, then the probability of no rain is 30%. This means that if I plan my day on the assumption that it is going to rain, then I might be (I've used the word 'might' again!!) very disappointed if it doesn't rain but I can't complain to the forecaster because he or she would point out that there was always a 30% probability of the rain not materialising. So what use is the forecast?!

I suppose our conversations would be very limited if all we communicated were certainties. There are very few certainties and none if we are talking about the future. Also the high probability, low impact events might be interesting but don't change our lives significantly. So if it doesn't rain tomorrow and I planned on it being wet, because the forecaster told me there was a 70% probability of precipitation, then my change of plan might be to do some gardening rather than work in the house. So what?! The real life-changers are the low probability, high impact events, very often not even considered. So if my house was hit and destroyed by a meteorite, oh boy that would be a life changer.

The more I think about probabilities, the more convinced I am that detailed long-term planning of our lives is a waste of time. We should live for the present, trying to improve our actions by learning from the past (positive and negative experiences) and attempt to use the present to make some positive impact on the future. In all probability you will agree with that........but then again, you might not! :-)

After all, we're related!

I am currently tending a very sick palm tree in my garden, which I think has had its roots attacked by hungry beetles. The symptom is a loss of leaves (fans) at an alarming rate and in the past week I have removed over twenty. I had a palm with a similar problem last year, which regrettably ended with the tree being chopped down. There is a small glimmer of hope with the current ailing patient because there is still some new growth from the crown, which might survive and if so, possibly grow and lead to further new shoots. But I know from my previous experience that I'm clutching at straws so as well as removing the poorly fans, I have tidied up the trunk and tried to give the tree a little bit of TLC and dignity during what could be the twilight of its life - after all, we're related! Now before you conclude that I'm off my trolley, let me explain my views on the relationships between me, the rest of mankind and other living species.

Let's start with our own species, homo sapiens. I am the result of a relationship between my two parents (two people). My parents were the results of relationships between two sets of parents (four people). My grandparents were the results of relationships between four sets of parents (eight people). Continuing this historic extrapolation and assuming my ancestral line remains 'pure' (an assumption that I will prove to be invalid later in this blog), let's look at how many people were associated with my current existence, at various points in history. If we go back eight generations, around the time Abraham Lincoln was born, there were 256 people responsible for my birth. Back to the time of Shakespeare and the number becomes 16,384. Twenty generations ago the number has risen to 1,048,576. This doubling every generation means that sixty-four generations ago, around the peak of the Roman empire, the number becomes one million trillion, which is several thousand times the number of people who have ever lived. If I now return to the assumption that my ancestral line is 'pure', clearly that can't be true and my existence, you're existence, everyone's existence is the result of a considerable amount of incest but far enough removed from the main family line so it wouldn't be obvious. This means that most people you come in contact with, including your partner, are probably relatives.

That's all very interesting but what does it have to do with my palm tree? The evidence for evolution is very strong. Indeed, biologists often make a distinction between the FACT of evolution (i.e. all living things are cousins) and the THEORY of what drives it (natural selection versus rival theories). The current estimate for the number of living species is around ten million. To draw all the relationships between the species in the form of a family tree on a manageable-sized piece of paper, is clearly impossible. The best illustration I have seen is the Hillis plot, which transforms the classic plot of a family tree into a more compact circular illustration stripped down drastically to around three thousand species in order to fit into even this huge diagram. In my view, what is more exciting than visual representations of genetic family trees, is what will be possible from processing genetic-relationship information. Over the past fifty years, computer processing power has followed something called Moore's Law. It is an empirical law and can be observed as the doubling of computer processing power in a given volume every eighteen months to two years. In financial terms, this means the cost of processing information is rapidly reducing. Current extrapolations suggest that by 2040 it should be technically possible and affordable to create a massive database of DNA sequences across all the animal and plant species.

So what about my palm tree? Well clearly there is very strong evidence that I have a genetic relationship with it and at some time in the future, probably after I have departed this world, it might be possible to 'plot' our relationship. So why shouldn't I show it the same respect as I should have for my own or any other species on the planet? I'll let you know if it survives.

Thinking About Thinking

On a couple of occasions my wife has made the following comment on my behaviour: "You think too much". I have thought deeply about her observation! Human beings communicate using languages they have learnt but whatever the native tongue, language is full of ambiguities and prone to misinterpretation. So what did my wife mean by her comment? I don't think (there I go again!) that she could possibly mean I should stop thinking; after all, thought is the basis for almost all our actions and interactions, so it is going on all the time. If she had said: "You spend too much time thinking and not enough time doing", then I would understand where she was coming from, particularly as my 'doing-to-thinking ratio' is a considerably lesser quantity than my wife's.

One of the discussion groups I am currently participating in, on the subject of thinking(!), has touched on the issue of male versus female thought processes and particularly the key differences. A view has been expressed that women's thoughts tend to relate to the natural (real) world whereas men use their ideas to relate to the conceptual world and I quote one comment: "I think a woman might generalise men as dreamers who get wrapped up in their theories". Well I have to admit to being able to relate to that point of view and one of my favourite pastimes is thinking about thinking.

We are part of a complex system that we try to understand by using simple mental models of what we think is going on around us. Sometimes our mental models become very rigid preconceived ideas and even when 'reality' doesn't match our model, we are still reluctant to modify our ideas. What is 'reality'? Is my view of the world, which is my 'reality', the same as your 'reality'? We are each using our sensors - seeing, hearing, smelling, touching - together with complex processing, which draws upon experience, intuition, tradition, preconceived ideas - and forming opinions of the 'reality' that surrounds us. Sometimes we attempt to breakdown the complexity of the environment into simple building blocks. But that doesn't always work. Colours should be simple, easy-to-understand components but why does, for example, the colour of my house appeal to me but look crap to you? Are we seeing the same colour but processing it differently, or vice versa?

There can be a danger of trying to squeeze a non-linear world into our linear mental models. Cause and effect is a common view of 'reality' - this affects that, which affects this, which affects those........ etc - but it doesn't always work like that! A affects B, which affects C, which after time modifies A, which affects B, which after time also modifies A. So the simple linear model has time- dependent feedback loops creating a non-linear function. To understand even a comparatively simple non-linear A-B-C model, we have to view it from a system perspective, understanding not just the constituent building blocks, but also the relationships between them.

As we move from concepts to 'reality', we can direct our thoughtful energies towards trying to understand issues such as why did the economic crisis occur, how do we solve our financial woes, how many species are there on the planet, are homo sapiens the only mammals that pop up everywhere, are we taking more out of the planet than we are putting back in, is the planet warming, if so what can we do about it, why do we have wars,........???? The issues go on and on but every time we try to simplify them and tackle them in isolation, we usually fail. So that's why I see a benefit in thinking about thinking, because although traditional thinking has resulted in tremendous developments for mankind, we don't seem to be able to solve some of the real crunchy and destructive issues that we have created, which face us and will plague future generations. So OK perhaps I should spend more time doing rather than thinking but if we carry on doing what we're doing, why should anything change? We will only change what we are doing if we stop doing and think about it........just a thought!

Memes and Genes

First here are two definitions from Dictionary.com:

Meme - a cultural item that is transmitted by repetition in a manner analogous to the biological transmission of genes.

Gene - the basic physical unit of heredity; a linear sequence of nucleotides along a segment of DNA that provides the coded instructions for synthesis of RNA, which, when translated into protein, leads to the expression of heredity character.

Meme is a much newer entrant to the English language than gene but which has a greater impact on our lives? That's a rhetorical question but even if it wasn't, the answer would probably be the type you would expect from an economist when you try to get her to commit to one of two possible economic forecasts - IT DEPENDS!

Genes travel vertically down family trees, from great grandmother to grandfather to mother to son........and so on. There is a 'dilution of the mix' through each hereditary step; we have 50% of our father's genes and 50% of our mother's genes. So the factor of relatedness becomes less with each generation, i.e. the great grandmother is less related to the mother's son, than the mother is to her son. Genes travel vertically but not horizontally, i.e. the father passes on genes to his daughter but not to his wife. Physical similarities can be genetic - 'he's got his father's nose', 'I can see you are mother and daughter'. But what about, for example, tempers and mood swings; are they hereditary (genetic) or copied behaviour (memetic)? Let's take a look at memes.

Memes are copied behaviour and although, as the definition implies, are analogous to genes, they are not constrained to be transmitted vertically down family trees and their 'mix' need not be 'diluted' when they are passed on. On the other hand, whereas genes are accurately copied, as DNA code, memes are very often approximated. If you have a particular religious belief, for example Christianity, you were not born a Christian but probably born from Christian parents. So at an early age you picked up Christian behaviour but YOUR version of Christian behaviour. Whereas your mother's and father's genes were faithfully reproduced to define the shape of your nose, your religious belief is one that you have formed and possibly continued to evolve, starting with the parental memes and picking up many other memetic influences as your mind and body develop.

Have you ever admired someone in authority, maybe a particular teacher when you were at school? Did your admiration cause you to pick up subconsciously some of his or her mannerisms? It does happen and that is a classic example of memetic behaviour.

Now let's return to my original rhetorical question, which has a greater impact on our lives - memes or genes? I said it depends, but on what? Genes and memes are inextricably linked because living organisms create memes. Genes can only be transmitted from parent to offspring and genetic transmission from generation to generation, takes many years. By contrast, memetic transmission is extremely rapid, often in hours rather than years, because the number of individuals that an individual can transmit a meme to is unlimited. Over the past ten thousand years, there hasn't been much change in humans at the genetic level but their culture, which is memetic, has experienced rapid developments. There is an on-going debate over 'nature versus nurture' on human behaviour, which in effect is questioning whether human attributes are inherited genetically, or developed through life memetically.

I still haven't given an opinion on whether genes or memes are the dominant factor on our behaviour and I won't! I would suggest you, the reader of this blog, should look back on your life and critically examine what has influenced your behaviour, positively and negatively. If you are able to undertake that analysis, you will be analysing memes. But you will still be left wondering whether your genetic make-up rendered you more susceptible to receiving particular types of memes and I am not sure you will ever be able to solve that conundrum, so the 'nature versus nurture' debate will continue!