(500) Days of Summer

"(500) Days of Summer" is not standard romantic comedy fare. There are some amusing moments but they are more warm or touching rather than funny.

Zooey Deschanel is a delight as the film's eponymous romantic focus. She brings a light quirkiness to the role that is very appealing. It's easy to see why the protagonist, Tom, falls for her.

Unlike many romantic comedies, the protagonist is a guy and the story is told from his perspective. The film is written by two men and directed by another. The movie has a far from a macho take on romance though.

This may be appropriate as men tend be more romantic than generally given credit for. Contrary to common wisdom, on average, men tend to fall in love faster than women. Also men tend to suffer more after a break-up. I suspect there might be an evolutionary drive for women for fall in love later: women historically (think from hunter-gatherer times up until a few decades ago) bore a huge risk if they fell pregnant to a man not committed to them. From this perspective, not falling in love too quickly is a sensible precautionary measure. Men suffer more after a break-up probably because in losing their partner they typically also lose their best friend. Women tend to have a stronger support network of friends to get them through.

We certainly see Tom suffer through his break-up, despite the support of his friends. Very sweetly, he gets the most support from his baby sister. The wisdom she has gleaned from her high school years helps him work through the end of his relationship.

An appealing part of the movie is that the story is told out of sequence. The memories of the romance are played out in the way that they might be during a break-up - Tom's mind flashes from the romantic beginning to the eventual disintegration of their relationship. Some events are revisited in his memory - romantic moments hold hints of trouble when analysed in retrospect.

I saw a reviewer criticise the movie for not being cynical enough and he objected to the ending's ultimately optimistic view of love. This might say more about the reviewer's love life that it does about the film. For me though, the message of the movie is that even though two people in a partnership will live out the same events, the experience of being in a relationship is ultimately a subjective and individual one. When these experiences diverge too widely, the result can be heart-break.

Meditation Tip #3

Following on from Tip #1 and Tip #2 comes

Meditation Tip #3: Empty your mind
This is the hardest part and probably the key to meditation. The idea is that we rarely give our minds a chance to relax. Sleep will restore our bodies, but even when we are asleep, our minds are still active and dreaming. This is, of course nonsense: we only dream in the shallower stages (REM) of sleep. Most of sleep time is spent in deeper sleep stages when our brains are quite chilled out.

The deeper stages of sleep aren't as well researched because, well, I guess even sleep scientists find dreams darn pretty interesting. It seems though that deep sleep might be a chance for your brain to shut-down and selectively forget some of the stuff that you've processed during the day.

In any case, meditation can replicate some of the tranquil level of brain activity that is experienced in sleep and it can't hurt, so...

The trick - and it's a trick that takes some practice - is to allow thoughts to come up and let them go.

Concentrating on your breathing is a good start (see Tip #2). If you meditate with your eyes open, allow your eyes to soft focus on a point.

Chanting a mantra might work for you. I'm sure there are entire books written documenting the effects of different mantras. For my money, I wouldn't go past "Omm".

One technique that I invented for myself (I'm curious as to whether it has been independently discovered) is "photographing the thoughts". When a thought surfaces, imagine a polaroid photo being taken of it. Visualise the image frozen in front of you. Imagine it passing slowly through my head. As the photo passes through your brain it takes the thought with you. As over thoughts arise, repeat the process.

Flashpacker transport options

There are no trains from Saigon to the highlands of Dalat. The journey involves a 7 hour bus trip which means either be an entire day on the highway, or an overnight trip. The bus company targets local and international tourists, so at least wouldn't be a repeat of my recent bus journey. Still, I wasn't keen to loose an entire day travelling or suffering a unpleasant night with even less sleep than my travel insomnia would allow.

A quick internet search showed two flights a day with Vietnamese Airlines. Since these flights are mainly filled by locals, the prices are reasonable (US$50 one-way) and, better still, can usually be booked at short notice. After a bit of a struggle, I got myself a ticket for a Monday morning flight.

The good news was that the flight would get me in to Dalat at 07:30 for a full-day of motorcycle touring. The bad news was that I'd have to be at the Saigon airport at 05:30. The taxi from the centre to the airport can take an hour and while I had been waking up at 04:00 I was trying to encourage my body clock to stay asleep at that time.

Budget travel guides, both Lonely Planet and online, were silent on hotel options near the airport. An internet search revealed a number of high-end options. I had been staying in budget accommodation for far in Vietnam, but having come to terms with my flashpacker status, I decided to go for it and booked a room online.


The driver stuffs my backpack into the back of his taxi. "Parkroyal Hotel?" he confirms, looking at my backpack and then from my sandals to my grubby T-Shirt. "Vang," I assured him. Yes, a luxury hotel for me tonight please! In the taxi I try to make myself look presentable. I put on my best, or at least cleanest, T-Shirt and take off my bead bracelets. I try brush some of the dirt off my backpack and zip away the shoulder and waist straps. It looks a little bit like a shoulder bag, but really is still just a backpack pretending.. There is nothing I can do about my sandals - the only footwear I have with me are my pair of Tevas.

To try and compensate for my slightly grubby looks, I booked myself in with the title "Doctor Jason Haines" (unfortunately, "Lord" wasn't an option). PhD doctorants can be eccentric can't they? I've worked with academics that wore sandals in far cooler climates than Saigon.

I try to feign confidence as a stroll into the lobby. I've stayed in hotels of this class in Europe and had to pay 3 times as much for the privilege - I could stay here a year if I maxed out my Visa card limit. I give my bag to a porter and present my passport - use two hands in Vietnam - to the receptionist with a "Chao buoi toi (good evening)". I get a friendly welcome, well at least after they've seen my credit card. I'm sure the sideways glance he given me is just in my imagination.

The porter deposits my "bag" in my room and I change for a swim in the indoor pool. Back in the room, I hit the mini-bar. To complete my 1st-world neo-tourist-colonist image, I take a Gin and Tonic ("Keeps away the mosquitos, old boy! Don't want a dose of malaria, what?").

Over the few hours of my stay I spend more money on tips for the porters and the mini-bar than I'd spent on accommodation the previous two nights. The room is both ludicrously cheap by European standards and ludicrously expensive by Vietnamese standards.

"I hope you enjoyed your stay. Thank you Doctor Haines," says the receptionist as I check out. No, thank you!

Flashpacking

A backpacker is someone travelling independently and on a budget. They avoid organised tours and typically choose simple accommodation and take local transportation.

"Flashpacking" is term that has arisen in recent years to describe a subclass of backpackers. The main distinction is that flashpackers are not so limited by budget constraints. High-end digital cameras and iPods are common equipment. Increasingly a laptop will also be crammed into the backpack between the sarong and the Lonely Planet guidebook.

I don't necessarily think there is anything noble about travelling on a shoestring. Some travellers take pride in how little they spend on a trip - the mock travel guide "Phaic Than" parodies this by boasting that one of its authors travelled on such a low budget that he actually made a profit on his last trip to Asia.

For me, independent travel is about the lifestyle. You are more open to meet people - both locals and travellers - when when avoiding organised tours and high-end accommodation. A backpack is a practicality and allows you to hop on the back of a motorcycle taxi which is often the best, if not the only, travel option to get to a budget hotel.

Having a tight budget for food might mean missing out on some local food. It will typically exclude the tourist-priced western dishes. I much prefer to eat local food while travelling, but after a few breakfasts of Pho (noodle soup), I feel no guilt about tucking into a plate of bacon and scrambled eggs with local coffee and fresh tropical fruits.

For me, independent travel is also about the experience. The broader the experience, the better. This goes for accommodation as well as food. Staying at a high-end resort is also an experience, but for my tastes is too generic and not as much of an adventure as staying in lower end budget options. At the other extreme, very low-end, dingy, flea-filled hotels aren't generally the sort of adventure one deliberately seeks out.


I'm on the "gadget-freak" sub-sub-category of flashpacker backpackers and I think I started early. I backpacked in 1999 with a CD player and a digital camera. This was in the dark days before MP3 players and when digital cameras were large, clunky, expensive battery eating machines. Laptops were impractical for travel and were without wifi. GPS devices wouldn't become popular until the US Defence Department turned off the accuracy reducing "selective availability". (oh dear, I think I've written a "kids of today don't know how good they've got it!" paragraph)

For my 2009 trip, I took both my digital cameras: a mid-range one with a good zoom lens and my pocket size waterproof one. I also brought my iPhone which has been invaluable. I think I got my full flashpacker stripes when I bought myself a MacBook Air duty free at the Hong Kong Airport. With free WiFi being pretty much ubiquitous, a laptop is usually the best method for internet access. It also allows me to write, write, write. Bus journeys are a good chance to sort photos, write emails and do blog posts.


I'm writing this on the bus from Dalat heading towards Saigon. I'm going to be dropped off on the way to visit Cat Tien national park. This is not the typical stop, so I'm hoping the driver remembers. I'm a bit reassured as I found the GPS coordinates on the parks official website. By entering them into the GPS app of my iPhone I know that we're now 54km and 1 hour 20 mins away from the park. Good thing too: I'd like a toilet stop for my bowels which are on an Immodium induced "pause".

Travel Lady

The Travel Lady taps on her keyboard. "Flight from Ho Chi Minh City to Dalat," she says, "Is okay with stopover?" I frown. It's a short flight. "Where is the stopover?" More tapping. "San Franciso," she says. "San Franciso?!"

I plan to fly the next morning and that's too late for online booking. I figured that going to a Vietnamese travel agent in Vietnam with a prominent "Vietnam Airlines" sign in front would mean I could book a Vietnam Airlines flight. Not only is my travel agent probably using one of those brain-dead flight searchers that don't include domestic flights, but apparently she lacks a basic understanding of world geography. And relative costs - she slides a printed quote over the desk: $750.

So, I could take a 50 minute flight for around $50 with Vietnamese Airlines, or spend 24 hours on planes and $750. Maybe I'll try another travel agent. "Cam-on; Thank you" I say and make my way for the door.

Bus trip to Can Tho

The Friendly Woman sitting in front of me on the bus motions to get my attention. She indicates in the direction of the ticket inspector and makes a sign. She spreads her fingers wide and taps her palm against her first curled in a circle - 50 thousand dong, about $2.50.

The ticket collector comes around as the bus is pulling out.  "150 thousand dong," he tells me. I tell him the price is 50 thousand and we start to haggle. "I paid 50 thousand to come here," I lie, not wanting to implicate my undercover accomplice, Friendly Woman.

The bus is stopped and the collector calls over the motorcycle driver who had brought me to the (slightly dodgy) bus station. Since he had already ripped me off for the taxi, I guess they figured I would be gullible enough to trust him for the bus fare. They come down to 80 thousand and I give up by offering 70 thousand. Friendly Woman glances at me when the inspector leaves. I show her 7 fingers and she raises her eyebrows. I guess being overcharged 20% is a lot for her. For me, I avoided the original "200% gullible foreigner surcharge" and I ended up being taken for around $1.


Friendly Woman offers me further advice. She points at my shoulder bag and mimes pulling her own close to her. She indicates in the direction of the Sleazy Guy who is sitting across the aisle from me. The warning wasn't really necessary. When the bus was still in the station, Sleazy Guy had shifted across to sit next to me. With a serpentine smile and tobacco breathe he nattered at me in Vietnamese. "Fine," I thought when he touched my arm, "the Vietnamese are open and tactile people. My pale skin and hairy arms must be a curiosity." When he put his hand on the inside of my knee, I thought that was a bit too open. A stern frown and a firm shove  sent him scurrying back to his side of the aisle. "Great," i thought, "now I know what solo female travellers have to put up with." So, no, I didn't need further warnings to be careful around Sleazy Guy.

Boat trip from Phu Quoc

I feel eyes upon me and look across the aisle to see a sweet little Vietnamese girl giving me a toothless grin.

I smile, wave and say "hi," thus utilising 50% of my Vietnamese vocabulary. Her mother encourages her to say "hello" which she does. I take a photo with my iPhone and show the screen across the aisle. She gets curious and takes a step closer. I hold out my hand for her to shake. It takes her a minute and lots of encouragement from her mother to gather the courage.

She's interested in my phone and I wrack my brain for apps that might be suitable for kids. I've got a little fireworks application that responses to touching the screen and this keeps both occupied for the next half an hour as we send explosions and flashing lights around the screen.

Tired of fireworks, we move on to my photo album. She's able to look through by swiping her finger across the screen. Her mother looks across the aisle with interest. I show them photos of Switzerland and try to mime that snow covered alps means that it's cold.
Every time a western woman appears in a photo, the girl points at the innocent Swedish girl sitting next to me and asks me a question in Vietnamese. I have no chance of explaining that my dark-haired ex-girlfriend in the photo is not the blonde Swede sitting next to me. I nod enthusiastically. "Sure," I say, "it might as well be her." The Swedish girl raises her eyebrows and gives me a side-wards glance. Regardless of how many different western woman come up, she points at the Swede asks the same question. I nod agreement. We get to a photo of wedding in a park I once visited. The girl points at me and the Swede and asks a question in Vietnamese. In for a penny... "Sure," I reply. "Our wedding in Russia was very lovely," I tell the Swedish girl. She gives a laugh

We look at photos of my Cambodian trip 10 years before. There's ONE photo of me in there standing naked under a waterfall facing away from the camera. My bare, white buttocks cause much giggling for everyone. I tap on to the next photo and the girl swipes back to it. More giggling. Well, serves me right I guess.

Meditation Tip #2

Following on from Meditation Tip #1 :

Meditation Tip #2: Breathe
Take deep relaxing breaths from your diaphragm. Belly breathing may or may not come naturally for you.  To practice, exhale and rest both hands lightly on your stomach with the tips of your middle fingers touching. As you breath in you should feel your fingers separate, touching again together on exhalation.

Some schools get excited about exactly which orifice you breath through. I've heard several yoga instructors even claim that airflow through one nostril or another will affect which side of your brain is more active (hmmm....). Outside of hayfever season, I prefer relaxed breathing through the nose. Do whatever works best for you.

Another aspect is the pace of breathing. I read a paper pointing out that many relaxing activities such as meditation and singing share a common element of a controlled exhalation. The theory is that replicating this breathing pattern may give the same relaxing effect. Try it and decide whether it works for you. The technique is simple: time your inhalation for around 4 seconds and your exhalation for 6 seconds.

Thoughts on: Whatever works

Not a movie review - head over to salon.com's review of Whatever Works for that - rather, my thoughts on the film, assuming the reader has seen it.

Despite a veneer of cynicism, "Whatever Works" is ultimately a optimistic philosophy of love. Indeed, the movie title is our protagonist's view of love explicitly expressed in one of his speaking-to-the-audience asides. While that philosophy might be an admirable one, the movie labours the point.

This film is also more than a bit deceptive in its presentation of this view of romance: it's not about two people finding each other and accepting each other for who they are. Rather, each of the main relationships in the film starts with someone falling in love based on some unknown initial spark - so far, so good: the ingredients for attraction are mysterious ones. However, the object of desire then conveniently finds a completely different, previously undiscovered, side of their personality. Each member of the Celestine family from Mississippi turns out to be one neurosis-resolution away from happiness and true love. While this may all be part of the joke, it comes across as more than a little contrived. The daughter, Melodie, discovers a suppressed intellectual curiosity. Her father has an almost insulting easy adjustment to the realization of his homosexuality. Melodie's mother, in an entertaining performance, discovers her talent for photography. Apparently photographer-artists are obliged to live in polygamous relationships; this aspect of the film is lifted directly from Allen's previous, and more satisfying, movie Vicky Christina Barcelona.

While a big part of a romantic relationship is self discovery, the personal growth resulting from the couples in Whatever Works is one sided. I'm not willing to credit Boris Yellnikoff's (Larry David) realisation that "maybe loving a human being isn't that bad" as being that much of a breakthrough.

My main problem with the film may be that the movie rests on Larry David's character whom I struggle to appreciate. Again from salon, Heather Havrilesky points out that Jason Alexander plays the "Larry David" character - as "George" in Seinfeld - better than Larry David does. In the recently concluded television series "Curb your Enthusiasm" Larry David portrays himself. The character George comes across as a lovable loser. In contrast, we get to see how much Larry David delights in showing us just how cynical and unlikable he is really is - it's the George character with mean-spiritedness replacing the goofy charm.

Overall, I didn't get many laughs from the film. This may in part be because I watched it on a long-haul flight with crackly audio on Swiss airline's mediocre entertainment system in economy-class squinty-vision. Comedies are usually better seen in a theatre to get the social proof of the rest of the audience laughing along.

Meditation Tip #1

A friend asked me about meditation and it occurred to me that I've learned meditation on at least 3-4 different occasions. Despite being wrapped in a lot of mystique, there seem to be a few essential points that are common across schools of meditation. I'll share my take on them over a few posts.

Meditation Tip #1: Relax
Find a comfortable position. I suggest lying down: leave your arms sightly away from your sides, palms and feet relaxed outwards.

Other schools suggest you sit. Qigong even goes for a standing position. Whatever works for you.

I keep my eyes closed. Alternative is to focus on a point in the distance and soften your gaze.

See also
Meditation Tip #2
Meditation Tip #3

Review: Shadowland

Piloboulus' Shadowland is in Zurich for November and the show is breathtaking. Describing this as "shadow puppetry" doesn't begin to do it justice. The show brings elements of dance and gymnastics and the shadow artistry itself is very creative. Shadows are used to convey an impressive amount of narrative while leaving the details to be filled in by the imagination of the audience. This is creates an incredibly immersive atmosphere.

Thematically, the piece is reminiscent of Alice in Wonderland or, more contemporarily, the darker Coraline. Shadowland is darker still. Unlike the pre-adolescent protagonists Alice and Coraline, our heroine is a teenage girl. Her fantasy world is correspondingly more ominous and more sexual. These elements are compellingly combined.

Diminishing returns of verbosity of ideas

A great insight in one sentence seems obvious, no matter how much of history [or] how many people have spent [time] not coming up with it. The same insight alluded to and digressed from for hours on end seems like a fantastic mountain of understanding.

This is from Meteuphoric.

Certainly many of the "great ideas" books I've read could be neatly summarised in a pamphlet, yet the author stretches the concept out to several hundred pages. There are certainly diminishing returns when expanding on an idea or investing time in reading one.

Let's take the following (reasonably well known) advice for idea generation:
1) Immerse yourself in all the background material
2) Forget about it for a while to let it digest
3) Wait for the solution to occur to you
I once read a book (link anyone?) that openly and unashamedly expanded this concept out to 30 pages. I guess just scrawling the points on a toilet wall (or, um, a blog post) wouldn't get the same audience or revenues as publishing a book.

This phenomenon is also apparent from many of the TED talks I see. Many of the talks are authors presenting a shortened version of their books. The key ideas of Dan Gilbert's Stumbling on Happiness are neatly summarised in his TED talks on happiness. I found Alain de Botton's book Status Anxiety an unsatisfying read, while his TED talk on the philosophy of success is sensational.

None of this will stop me from buying every second book that is implicitly plugged on TED. The value I find in reading those books is not so much in expanding on the idea, but giving by giving myself the concentrated time to absorb the idea more.

Thus, succinctly summarised ideas aren't necessarily more obvious. Rather they perhaps just require more effort to absorb. So I disagree with the statement "a great insight in one sentence seems obvious". My counterexample is the Meteuphoric blog itself. A main reason I subscribe is the surprisingly regularity of exactly those one-sentence great insights. A half-formed idea of mine recently crystallized from the description, almost in passing, of corporations as a form of super-human intelligence. Another great insight is the idea of vegetarianism as a form or martyrdom - the same concept is particularly revealing when examining the recent backlash against geo-engineering solutions to climate change.

Katja Grace on love & marriage

Katja Grace, former ANU student and blogger of Meteuphoric. How could one not like a former ANU student?

Katja will regularly show a stunningly unique viewpoint on a topic. Recently she had a thought provoking post on love and the marriage contract.

Google Suggest

From Digg, via slate.com comes these two articles:

Awkward Suggestions - Let's have fun with the Google search box
The winner of the Google Suggest contest

Selective use of grammar gives an hilarious and sometimes disturbing revelation of an alternative Google Zeitgeist.

Movie review: Inglourious Basterds

Perhaps not a movie review, more my thoughts on the film.  As often, I'd suggest that the wonderful writers over at salon.com give a better review of Inglourious Basterds than I can. I'll assume the reader has seen the film as I'll refer to scenes and include lots of spoilers. That aside, let's go!



Inglourious Basterds contains great acting, great dialogue and a compelling story. Tarantino has not so much borrowed historical facts as incorporated the mythos of World War II into his film. Most of the Nazis - and almost all the Germans in the movie are Nazis - are portrayed in a similar light as they are in computer games like Castle Wolfenstein. This isn't an attempt to achieve a realistic depiction of events, rather the Nazis are deliberately used as a mechanism to embody a cartoonish good-vs-evil battle.

The Nazis that have the larger roles come across as almost universally unsympathetic. No tears are shed when they are slaughtered off brutally and individually, or on mass. The one bad-guy that Tarantino humanises is German war hero Fredrick Zoller (played by the likeable Daniel Brühl in his first non-German movie). Unfortunately, Tarantino doesn't allow the audience to preserve their sympathetic feelings for him. In his final scene he is revealed as a chauvinist and just as evil as all the others. To emphasize the point, he is shot and in his dying moments manages to kill off the movie's heroine.


Not that Tarantino has ever displayed any sentimentality towards his movies' characters, the good or evil. Similarly here, almost every major character is bumped off. Tellingly, the only significant character that survives is Brad Pitt. I must wonder whether Tarantino would have allowed this character to live if it had been played by anyone other than a star of Pitt's profile.

Brad Pitt does give a solid performance in the movie as Lt Aldo Raine. I have to wonder though whether another actor with less of a profile might have brought more to the role. Some of the scenes - in particularly, one where Lt Raine does an atrocious job of masquerading as an Italian film maker - seem overburdened by Brad Pitt's ego.

Other actors in the movie are superb. Christoph Waltz is breathtaking as Col. Hans Landa, the Nazi "Jew Hunter". He plays the role with subtlety and precision and his Best Actor award at Cannes is well deserved. It will be worth rewatching the film for Waltz's performance alone. Many of the best scenes in the movie are based around clever dialogue building a delicious, almost unbearable tension. Waltz carries these scenes seemingly effortlessly.



An aspect of Tarantino's movie making that I find less favourable is his compulsion to pay tribute to movies he loves. When done with a light touch, this can work well. The opening scene of Waltz interrogating a farmer and his family is masterful. It's easy to imagine a similar scene set on a ranch in the wild west rather than a farm in occupied France. In other parts of the film, genre injection is more clumsily handled. Several characters are introduced by flashing up their character's name in a yellow, stylised font. This is jarring for those sections of the film where Tarantino had otherwise immersed us in a WWII genre.

WWII is not a genre that Tarantino has worked with before. He largely handles it well. I particularly appreciated that the movie was acted in the language that the characters would have naturally spoken under the circumstances. This cosmopolitan mix of German, French, English and Italian is refreshing and brave for a Hollywood movie.

Some elements of the story of WWII came across to me as anachronisms. Lt Raine's gimmick of carving a Nazi scar into the foreheads of released German prisoners doesn't make much sense in context. Post WWII, with the defeat of the Nazis, the swastika became a symbol synonymous with evil. At the time though, it was representative of the Third Reich, one of the world's superpowers. For the Nazis, the swastika was a symbol of pride and national strength.  How would Americans of today react if marines captured in Iraq or Afghanistan had the American flag tattooed on their forehead?

A similar anachronism was the willingness of Col. Landa to sabotage the German war effort. Before the D-Day invasion, the ultimate defeat of Germany was far from certain. Would a high ranking Colonel respected by his side as a hero really place such heavy odds on the Allies being triumphant?


The faults are really nit-picks though. Overall, Inglourious Basterds is one of the few Tarantino movies I've thoroughly enjoyed (Pulp Fiction being the other). Overlooking the scenes of wincing horror/violence, Tarantino has put his talents of pacing and dialogue to use to create a movie that establishes a new sub-genre in World War II films.

Will humans ever stop fighting wars

This week's Radio Lab has a fascinating program on the, somewhat broad, topic of change. Go listen to the podcast; it's much more entertaining than my thoughts below.

They start with the question: will humans ever stop fighting wars?

They cite a contemporary survey claiming 90% of Americans say "no". In the 1980s this percentage was lower and people were optimistic for a peaceful future. I'm sure people's optimism for peace correlates with their awareness of war at the time. With the US being at war since 2002 it's no wonder that a peaceful future is hard to imagine.

A natural cognitive bias makes us over-estimate change that will happen in the short term and under-estimate long term change.

Short term we will probably have constant war. There has been a war somewhere in the world everyday since WW2.

Long-long term, a number of factors could change. Space exploration could lead to us mining the asteroid belt and effectively unlimited resources. Virtual reality could let each of us live in our own perfect world. We are evolving and we could in the long term become a more peaceful species. Radio Lab touches on this last point

The show's first story looks at how quickly a cultural change can affect aggression in society. The example is a great one: a troop of baboons in Kenya.  A disease wipes out the alpha males in the troop. Without the more aggressive members, the troop becomes peaceful. Males would reciprocate female grooming and, very unusually, even male-male grooming became common. 20 years later the troop remains peaceful. New-comers to the group would learn non aggressive interaction. It's a small natural experiment that seems to support the old adage "If the world were run by women, there would be no wars."

It's clear that aggression will be culturally influenced, no doubt even more strongly in humans. Whether your "tribe" is a biker gang or a group of artists will affect your view on how to resolve conflict.

An evolutionary biologist is interviewed and sceptical of the result: until there is a genetic change baboons are still baboons and, presumably he means, naturally aggressive. But this "natural" state will depend on circumstance. It seems clear to me that baboons have a spectrum of aggressive behaviour and in the right circumstances can really be quite peaceful.


Radio Lab's 3rd part comes back to evolutionary biology and looks at a Russian experiment in domestication. A group of foxes was bred selectively to remove the foxes that were scared if humans. It's fascinating that the domestication process that took thousands to years to turn wolves into dogs can, when finally tuned and concentrated, turn foxes into pets in 10 years. The more interesting number I would want to hear, is how many generations this took.

This makes me think of selective breeding in the context of reversion to the mean. The original biological experiment on this was looking at bean sizes. These have a normal distribution. Over generations, larger beans will have descendants that are smaller, or rather, closer to the mean. For humans, two genius parents will typically expect their child to be less brilliant than themselves.

The implication of the domestication story is that selective breeding can alter the mean. I then wonder how permanent a change this is. If a domesticated population is then allowed to breed naturally, will they revert to their previous mean? I guess it would depend on the natural evolutionary pressures they find themselves under, once the absence of the artificial evolutionary pressure of domestication. In most circumstances, fear of humans is a pretty sensible default behaviour for animals.

Back to our friendly foxes, we find that not only do they become friendly, but they experience physical changes. Their ears become floppier, their tails more curly, their teeth smaller, their coats multicoloured, their bones thinner and thus their faces more feminine. Essentially they became more dog-like. Why does this happen? Radio Lab says: "No one knows why"

This is the point in the program where I jump up in my seat with my hand raised, "Me! Me! I know the answer to this one! Hormone levels are influenced in part by genetics. Domestication selects for those animals that are less aggressive. These animals have less testosterone and more oestrogen. Hormones also affect physical appearance, thus the foxes become more feminine."

Radio Labs' evolutionary biologist has a different theory: he also relates the changes to brain chemistry, but picks on adrenaline and the neural crescent cells that build the adrenaline glands. The implication is that selecting away from aggression selects away from adrenalin and the crescent cells that also build pointy ears and sharp teeth. Oh well, guess I've still got plenty to learn about evolutionary biology.

Radio Lab notes that humans are also physically changing. Our teeth have become smaller and other domesticated attributes. The theory goes, that as human tribes have grown in size, cooperative behaviours have become increasingly important. Overly aggressive individuals have been selected out of the gene pool.

I've got to wonder how much aggression we can eliminate. Corporate culture seems to attract and encourage aggressive behaviour. In contrast to the idea that society will select for empathy, sociopaths seem to be successful in companies. This success carries over into financial success and elevated status in society. High status correlates with having more children than average. So are we really breeding aggression out of species or will we just create more sociopaths?

Simon Cowell - still cocky after all these years

From the periodically thought-provoking Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project comes a link to an article by Simon Cowell: A letter to my shallow, reckless, cocky younger self. I'd rather retitle it as "A letter from my shallow, reckless, cocky older self to my shallow, reckless, cocky younger self"

While Simon thinks he's being introspective in looking back how arrogant he used to be, he actually displays a shocking lack of self awareness in how arrogant he currently is.

He seems to want to tell his younger self: "Don't worry about the insecurities you may have, in the end you will find out you're superior to the idiots around you." What he tries to present as "lessons learned from the school of hard knocks" comes across as "you were wrong to think you knew everything then, but don't worry, once you get older, you will know everything."

Like Gretchen Rubin, I can't say I really know Simon, having only seen him in youtube clips filling the role of "arrogant judge" on American Idol. Gretchen, though is much kinder to him.

Monkey see...

Courtesy of the freakonomics blog comes an article saying that monkey's also experience the uncanny valley effect. Original science daily is here, unfortunately without video.

A wonderful youtube video made the rounds recently of a chimpanzee's reaction to magic tricks. (may be more watchable with the sound down....)


It is interesting to see that the chimpanzee is often surprised and engaged by magic.

The interesting point of comparison is that children under 3 years old generally don't understand magic. At that age, their perceptions and expectations of how the world works are not well formed; not understanding the laws of physics, they aren't surprised when they are violated. This is well cited, an essay by Dave Kaye that talks about this.

Parrots can also detect magic. The charming book Becoming a Tiger: How Baby Animals Learn to Live in the Wild talks about the parrot Alex who would narrow his eyes tap his beak angrily on the table if his trainer did tricks with disappearing cashews (p320, since I went to the effort of looking it up :-) ).

From this, I'd conclude that chimpanzees and parrots have at least the intelligence level of a three year old child.

More fun

Those wacky Swedes from The Fun Theory bring us their latest, wonderful project: an Bottle Bank Arcade Machine.

Obama's Nobel

Should I write a blog post about Obama's Nobel Prize? I don't know if I have anything worthwhile to contribute beyond the huge amount of articles that have already been written. The Economist gives a reasonable and typical reaction.

Obama deserves credit for the progress he has made in rebuilding America's tattered international relations. A lot of what he has achieved however, is just partial repair of the damage Bush inflicted on the US's foreign relations. It remains to be seen how successful Obama's approach will ultimately be. Renewed friendship with Europe has not led to significant commitments to support the war in Afghanistan and Obama's policy in that war may end up in a quagmire. The precedents of history in both foreign involvement in Afghanistan and America's involvement in Vietnam, don't bode well for peace in Afghanistan. In Iraq, troop withdrawal might ultimately lead to a failed state. His stance and work towards a nuclear free world is admirable and is gaining some traction with Russia, however little progress has been seen in North Korea or Iran. His dealings with Iran have been balanced a soft touch with tough talk, but it will be many years before its clear whether his approach is the correct one.

While I support and admire Obama's work and his positions and I do sincerely hope that he is right, there are certainly alternative more hawkish positions. It is far too early to tell to say that Obama's approach is the right one.

There is the counter-argument that the prize is more rewarded for effort rather than results. I take this as a criticism of the Nobel Prize committee. The article cites Carter and Arafat/Rabin.  I'd rather go with the more 1973 award:  Henry Kissinger - Nobel Prize laureate; Accused war criminal.

The Nobel Prize for Peace stands in contrast to other Nobel Prizes for Literature and Physics that only make awards decades after a recipient's work has been validated.

The reactions from the right, have been so over the top as be not worth commenting on. I thought David Frum made an interesting point, that the prize may hamper Obama.

Why women have sex

The book Why women have sex came out in the last week.

The title seems chosen by a marketing committee and while it claims to be based on new research, much of the content is based on stuff that is already well-known. For example, the notion of love as mechanism to keep your partner around long enough to raise the kids echos Helen Fisher.

Other repeated contemporary ideas are the explanations of attraction based on theories from evolutionary biology: women are attracted to men for reasons of survival and reproduction. A well muscled man will help protect you and your children from sabre-tooth tigers and rival men. Signs of high testosterone that women find appealing in men (strong jaw, deep voice) mirror signs of high oestrogen in women that men find appealing (good skin, breast-hip-weight ratio). Signs of affluence demonstrate ability to care for a women and her children.

In this context it's all a bit frightening when one thinks of one's own behaviour and what that signals to the world. I remember discovering colleague of mine owned a Porsche. He had a similar income to mine and while I consider a sports car an unnecessary financial extravagance, I had to admit that it was sexy. He was a nice guy, and the car did make me think of him as even cooler. I'm also sure it made him more attractive to some women. Certainly good grounds for anxiety and insecurity.

Fortunately, the authors don't believe in pure biological determinism though. There's a nice bit of terminology "Love map" used to describe the idiosyncratic attributes we individually find attractive. That term was new to me, although apparently it has also  been around for a while.

Some of the reviews breathlessly tell that women don't only have sex for love. Shock! A book could be written about "Why we Eat" and go into hundreds of reasons as to why we eat, with "hunger" being just one of them. A trip to a restaurant can be seen as signalling - a celebration of an event, to mention a recent example. I have the feeling though, that books with "Sex" in the title sell more than books with "Eat"

Still, the book does seem to have more depth and may be worthwhile. The best read was Salon's interview with the author.

Was the Sexual Revolution not all it was cracked up to be?

From the, often wonderful, Overcoming Bias comes a link to The Man Who is Thursday, who gives us his thoughts on the sexual revolution. OB gives his take from a men's rights perspective.

It had never occurred to me that the sexual revolution was somehow forced upon women to their detriment. He apparently believes this to be a widely held view - I wish he had included a link. The argument seems to be that women are being exploited if they have sex outside of marriage. It's quite big of him to have moved on beyond that.

I'm not fully comfortable with his apparent single dimensional scale of alpha-beta. But, say we can enumerate some combination of factors - wealth, looks, intelligence, humour - that we can rank partners on... I'll let him off the hook on this one, although its questionable whether these all correlate with sexual performance.

If sexual performance is a criteria for a suitable mate - deciding whether someone is an alpha or beta- surely the sexual revolution is a huge step in allowing people to find out more information in advance of commitment.

Even granting his premises though, why does he then assume that alpha men are more likely to have more partners than alpha women? Further, that alpha men will sleep with beta women, but alpha women not with beta males.

So, sorry, but he contradicts himself: he comes back around to the point that the sexual revolution benefited men (at least alpha men) because of the rather out-dated notion that men only want sex and women only want to find a committed partner.

I found it interesting because the guy is apparently not a complete moron, has thought his argument through, but comes to conclusions that are completely unpalatable for me. Part of me also fears there may be some thread of truth among the BS.

I am Tim Ferriss' bitch

So, Tim Ferris was posted in a recent and interesting TED talk.

As a result, I've:

bought his book

started learning to swim with the "Total Immersion" technique (the "Total Immersion Freestyle" video can be bought from amazon, or is -ahem- available online)

started Michel Tomas' French CDs (also -ahem- available online) and still mean to get around to the 1 hour language headstart

I'll post a review of the book once I've had more of look.

"Cold Skin" Albert Sanchez Pinol

Spoiler laden book review...
--
Cold Skin creates a wonderful, palpable atmosphere. From the moment the
protagonist sets foot on the island, a feeling of cold and oppressing
humidity sets it, penetrating the flesh. The image in my mind is of an
inhospitable, barren landscape. I imagine the island devoid of colour -
the only breach in the monotonous grey being the shards of broken glass
mounted as armour in the walls of the lighthouse.

The discovery of the abandoned cottage and the first encounter with
Gruner, the lighthouse keeper, serve to increase the sense foreboding.
At this point, I was expecting a slow unfolding mystery, but was instead
was plunged into a nightmare. The sense of dread turns to horror when
evening falls on the island and our protagonist is lucky to survive an
almost overwhelming attack.

One reviewer compared the novel to HG Wells, presumably recalling the
subterranean, monstrous Morlocks of The Time Machine. The comparison
that came to my mind is Lovecraft and the aquatic horrors of the Cthulu
mythology. The monsters of Lovecraft are, however, the minions of an
ancient and god of indescribable evil and power - their motivation being
the dominion of the world and the enslavement of mankind's very soul.
The monsters of Cold Skin, the Sitauca, struck me more as a force of
nature. Their attacks on the island comparable to that of a violent
storm. At first the attacks seemed to be impersonal, as if they were
african army ants consuming everything in their path.

Although we never have the motivation of the attacks clearly explained,
the mere idea that these creatures could even motivation is part of the
exploration of one of the themes of the novel. One of the themes is an
allegory of war and the dehumanisation of the enemy I'm still trying to
work out why the author chose to set the book in post World War I. At
first I was thinking the novel drew parallels to the Great War. The move
I think about it though, I see stronger parallels to colonial histories
- in particular I am reminded of Australia's & North America's history
of invasion. English settlers in Australia declare the country to be
Terra nullius - empty land; uninhabited territory - the aborigines not
considered sufficiently advanced to claim a stake on the land.

The flip-side of the theme of dehumanisation is empathy for "the other".
The introduction of "the mascot", Aneris, is the first step in taking
the novel beyond that of a survival tale. Through her, the protagonist
and the reader begin to empathise with the Sitauca, at first in the way
that one might sympathise with a slave, or even a pet. The sympathy
deepens as the protagonist meets and befriends the children. This leads
to a temporary truce which is eventually spoiled by Gruner's incapacity
of dealing with the Sitauca as anything other than an enemy.

Despite Gruner's demise, our protagonist despairs of making peace and
effectively becomes Gruner; the arrival of the replacement weatherman
closing the circle. This part of the novel was the most unsatisfying for
me. With a truce so tantalisingly close, couldn't the Sitauca have
distinguished between the motivations of the two men or, at the least,
be given a chance to? Wasn't the protagonist's relationship with Aneris
substantially different from that of Gruner's? Was it also inevitable
that he would beat her?

The protagonist's sexual relationship with Aneris is a key element of
the plot and certainly the most disturbing. I'm wondering what the
author is trying to achieve here. One part relates back to the theme of
humanising and dehumanising the enemy. This starts with seeing Aneris as
an object of sympathy - and later as an object of passion, affection and
even what is described as love.  Another part is certainly to horrify
the reader. The emotions it provokes, for me at least, were ones of
shock and disgust at the men's behaviour. In part it is a reaction to
the ideal of zoophilia. In part it is revulsion at the men's
exploitation of this poor creature. This view is deliberately muddied by
the protagonist though: we are led to believe that Aneris is a willing,
or at least an indifferent, participant in these trysts. And the
protagonist claims growing feelings for her.

Another aspect of the men's relationship with Aneris is that their
absolute dominance of her - both physically and sexually - gives them a
power over the Sitauca in a way that their closely fought battles don't.
Again I'm reminded of colonists and that sexual relationships between
them and native slaves was far from unknown. This perspective may, in
part, explain how the protagonist could be violent towards Aneris
despite, or even because, of his feelings for her. This gives him a way
to vent his impotence at the enemy and express anger at himself for his
growing sympathy towards both Aneris and the Sitauca.


Two final aspects of the book remain unclear in my mind. They may be
related. One is a repeated reference to the Frazer's study of religion
and mythology "The Golden Bough". I haven't read it, so can't comment,
although it was recommended to be just last week. The second aspect was
the ending and final conversation with the new arrival. The protagonist
describes the island as being a choice and that the new man could leave
by walking across the water. Another reviewer commented that "Inner
exiles are selfmade, thus the worst". Something for more thought...

Zeitgeist - The Movie

From Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear...

Zeitgeist - The Movie has apparently attracted a lot of internet attention. It links together three conspiracy theories of religion, 9/11 and shadow figures behind international finance. Or, rather, it presents three conspiracy theories, backs them up with nothing more than hearsay and leaves the viewers to draw their own conclusions.

The movie in presented in three main parts. The first advances the theory that Jesus is a myth and presents as evidence a string of ancient gods that were also -born on December 25 -of a virgin -had twelve followers -were resurrected -etc -etc -etc. Whilst I enjoy a bid of god-bashing, perhaps more than most, Zeitgeist does a terrible job here by presenting a subject clouded in uncertainty as something quite clear cut. Like much of the film, a bit of research shows that the claims they make are unsubstantiated and notoriously poorly cited.

Part 2 of the movie has yet another shot at the 9/11 conspiracy theory. There is great material in this subject area. Why did WTC building 7 fall? Why wasn't there more obvious debris at the other crash sites? There are some beautifully presented conspiracies on this and they are definitely worth looking into. Once you've read the conspiracies, have a look at the many credible sources debunking them. Popular Mechanics does a decent job here.

Part 3 then drags out another old conspiracy that the banking elite run the world. The fiat money system is a very interesting topic. A similar conspiracy movie Money as Debt does a much better job of providing genuine (and entertaining) educational material on the monetary system before launching off into conspiracy theory. Zeitgeist is lighter on the education and even heavier on the uncited conspiracy. I've yet to find a simple layman's explanation on this, but trust me:

• The federal bank does not exist to make bankers rich


• Bankers don't have a license to print as much money as they want

The best evidence I can offer for this is (recent US$ devaluation aside), the US economy has not collapsed under spiraling inflation as, say, Zimbabwe has.

Zeitgeist goes further than this with the apparently popular right-wing rant, that income tax is illegal and, um, intended to make the aforementioned bankers rich. Do Americans really see no value in the government services their tax dollars pay for? Would they really be happier in a laissez faire system?

Then, for good measure, Zeitgeist throws in conspiracies about the Council for Foreign Relations and (booga booga!) World Government. CFRs trade-wonkish policy prescriptions may excite economists, but they are a long way from an oppressive all-powerful world government that Zeitgeist claims is being built behind the scenes.

Conspiracy theories are fascinating in what they reveal about human nature and psychology. For an antidote, have a look at:

• Some more humor
  
• Some serious debunking and the psychology behind it

Outsourcing wifery and the economic incentives of house cleaning

From Saturday, November 10, 2007

Doing the CFA gives me an excuse to subscribe to great blogs from economists and The Economist.

Here's an Economist post about establishing a
http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2007/11/outsourcing_wifery.cfm

The recommendation to fairly value house cleaning by outsourcing it is one that Juliette and I employed until recently. My reasons were actually explicit in avoiding an unfair portion of the housework being taken on by Juliette.

Indeed, now that our cleaner has gone AWOL, Juliette does do the majority of the cleaning. I always claim that men aren't necessarily more lazy than women when it comes to cleaning. Rather, men have a higher "filth tolerance" than women. Thus it is usually the woman of the household that will decide something needs cleaning and do it. If the cleaning was neglected a little longer a man would do some cleaning.

That aside, Juliette has now delegated me the task of finding a replacement cleaner. Here we come to an interesting point about economic incentives. While Juliette might consider it fair for me to find a cleaner, I have no incentive to do so: the current arrangement of Juliette doing the majority of cleaning is unfair, but incurs little or no cost on me.

I also note that our previous cleaner was found by me when I was sharing a house with a male friend. Here the incentives of living in a filthy bachelor pad prompted me to find a cleaner (rather than do an unfair amount of cleaning).

Perhaps I should lend Juliette my copy of Naked Economics...

Economics humour

From Saturday, November 3, 2007

Economics humour is not a contradiction in terms. Have a look at:

• The short video The Principles of Economics, translated by the one and only Stand up Economist
  
• The Economics of Gold Digging on the
  Freakonomics blog - Freakonomics is high on my blog roll.
  
• Again courtesy of Freakonomics, the song Girl, Your Marginal Benefit Is Far Greater than your Marginal Cost

Facebook is dead

Well, back to the blog. I'll cross-post some of the old stuff from facebook and see where I'm more inspired to post.