God works in simple but wondrous ways

The supernatural is part of our world, but it often escapes our notice. A friend in Vietnam offers this testimony as to how a simple act of kindness and a word shared can be used by God in a mighty way to draw someone to Jesus.

More than a month ago, one of our neighbours in another unit had a sick kitten and didn't know what to do. She also had been haunted by ghosts, in her own words, for the past few weeks. She literally had felt her hair being blown over her ears and there had been knocking on her door in the middle of the night.

She first sought a fortune-teller who told her that she was cursed and that she had to move out of that place immediately. However, she did not feel peace with that advice and turned to my wife and I because she remembered that we were Christians.

It had been a simple act of buying some food for her new kitten a few weeks earlier that gave us a chance to tell her a bit about God. We didn't realise it then, but a seed had been planted in her heart by the Holy Spirit.

So when she called and told us about the "haunting" and her sick kitten, we immediately felt the need to go over to see her and asked our pastor and friends for immediate prayer covering. We got down on our knees to pray for covering over ourselves and our family and friends as we knew we were going to enter into spiritual battle.

We went over and my wife shared with her that ghosts are not as we think and that there is a spirit world unseen but yet have power to affect the natural world. Then we shared the Gospel and asked her if she would like to receive Christ. She accepted (all praise and glory be unto God) and we asked if she had things like tarot cards and stones or pendants for good luck. She brought out a set of tarot cards and a pendant that had been given to her for luck.

Through the prompting of the Holy Spirit my wife asked if she had anything else and mentioned the 12 Viet zodiacs. She suddenly said she had forgotten that she had stuck a 12 zodiac golden sticker on her phone battery so she took that out. I ripped it up. We prayed for a cleansing for her and her unit and took the objects downstairs and tore up the tarot cards and crushed the pendant with a rock.

The next morning, she rang and told my wife it was the first time in a few weeks that she had not been haunted and that she had had a peaceful sleep.

In our hearts we gave thanks to God: "Hallelujah ... Praise the Lord." 

[] Photo credit: Photo by David Monje on Unsplash (Cropped)

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Careful! The world is catechizing you

BUSINESS NEWS: "The English family that founded the sex-worker social media platform OnlyFans extracted tens of millions of pounds from its parent company in the last year, as it profited from a lockdown-induced rush to use online pornography" (The Guardian here).

During August, leading news sources covered with a great deal of interest the twists and turns of a business based on pornography. Maybe it was a complete hoax, a publicity stunt, but first OnlyFans banned "adult content" from the platform but quickly went on to announce a reprieve. Given its prevalence, sympathetic publicity of the impact on sex workers' income may have been behind the policy reversal.

So, during the month we observed normal business news item being interspersed with the affairs of "sex workers" and conjecture about how customers might be affected by a service breakdown in the provision of pornographic "products"! 

What's odd about this type of "news" is how it fits into the commonplace pattern of acceptance of immorality. A perspective that the behaviour involved is undermining society is lacking completely. The issue is also how this amoral mindset is, day by day, being absorbed by society at large through such influences.

Another example of  Western societies' loss of their moral compass and its likely impact is highlighted by a sports fan who followed the Summer Olympics intently.  He writes about his family watching the American TV coverage:

Every day we were taught to celebrate men weightlifting as women or to smile as a male diver talked about his husband. Every commercial break was sure to feature a same-sex couple, a man putting on makeup, or a generic ode to expressive individualism. And of course, Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird were nearly ubiquitous. If America used to be about motherhood and apple pie, it’s now about birthing persons and lesbian soccer stars hawking Subway sandwiches. 

Then he puts those comments into a broader context:

Some will object at this point that the last paragraph is filled with a toxic mix of homophobia, heteronormativity, cisgender privilege and a host of other terms that were virtually unknown until five minutes ago. But those labels are not arguments against biblical sexual morality so much as they represent powerful assumptions that no decent person could possibly believe that homosexuality is sinful behavior, that marriage is between a man and a woman, and that switching genders is a sign of confusion more than courage.

What NBC presented as heroic and wonderful was considered wrong and troublesome by almost everyone in the Christian West for 2,000 years. Is it possible that instead of deconstructing the beliefs that have marked Christianity for two millennia, we might want to deconstruct the academic jargon our culture has only come to affirm within my lifetime? Remember, it was only in 2008—hardly the dark days of the Middle Ages—that Barack Obama said he did not support marriage for same-sex couples.

This blog has many times addressed the concern that certain lines of thought have shaped the way we think so that, for many of us, rationalism, consumerism, and individualism are like the air we breathe. This blog regularly points out the lapses in science, where practitioners are so blinkered by a series of assumptions about the nature of the human person, and of the cosmos, that they fail to see the rich vein of research possibilities that an openness to spiritual reality offers. Check out this blog's archive for many relevant posts.

Our featured writer, Kevin DeYoung, gets down to the nitty-gritty:

The Christian family, Christian church, and Christian school must not assume that the next generations will accept the conclusions that seem so obvious to older generations. We must talk about the things our kids are already talking about among themselves. We must disciple. We must be countercultural. We must prepare them to love and teach them what biblical love really means. We must pass on the right beliefs and the right reasons for those beliefs.

We must prepare our children—and be prepared ourselves—that following Christ comes with a cost (Luke 9:23). The Jesus who affirmed marriage as between a man a woman (Matt. 19:4-6), the Jesus who warned of the porneia [disordered desires] within (Mark 7:20-23), the Jesus who warned against living to be liked by others (John 12:43), this Jesus demands our total allegiance (Matt. 28:20).

The world is already busy promoting its catechism. The only question is whether we will get busy promoting ours. 

We promote our Christian beliefs within our family first. Therefore, parents must be strong themselves in order to pass on a rich legacy. That parents can resist the invitations from neighbours or colleagues to betray their Christian instincts, will provide children with a life lesson in how to withstand the powerful pressure of peers. 

Read The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation and Live Not By Lies, both by concerned American parent, journalist Rod Dreher. He has powerful insights into the way the sexual revolution has created a true transformation of the moral foundation of society. This bombshell has now been coupled with Critical Justice Theory, launching all kinds of "rights" into the midst of an population ignorant of where the basis for human rights came from, namely, the revelation that we are made in the image of God.

In addition, parents must limit their own use of social media, other devices and TV, and thereby provide a model for their children.

Another point made on this blog has been that couples should be generous in planning the size of their family. That decision will guide parents in many other important areas of decision-making, such as how to create a work-life balance, and in the need to rein-in ambitions that those enamoured by the world pursue.

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America's decline, society's collapse into trauma

TikTok is rife with young people, particularly young women, taking time to identify something in their life that caused distress or anger. The #trauma hashtag has had a staggering 3.9 billion views. With "trauma" defined as a deeply disturbing experience, what is going on in society that turns predominantly young TikTok users to apply this concept to their own life?

Poppy Coburn finds that there has been the popularisation of ‘trauma theory’ — "the idea that most of a person’s problems can be traced back to some unresolved, vague traumatic events in their life" — related to a book that is ranked #1 in sales on the Healing section of Amazon, The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, Brain and Body in the Transformation of Trauma by psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk. This is a seven-year-old publication whose target audience is doctors specialising in post-traumatic syndrome disorders.

Coburn notes that the book's success ties in with the fact that "‘trauma’ has become the latest fad to hit feminist wellness circles":

Perhaps the reason for its enduring popularity with young, socially-conscious people is thanks to van der Kolk’s assertion that, left untreated, trauma can begin to manifest itself through physical ailments. Constant headaches? Back pain? Short of breath? Don’t call an ambulance, call a psychiatrist.

While there's no denying the reality of the link between trauma and physical or mental conditions:

What is curious is why exactly so many ostensibly normal, healthy young people believe themselves to be suffering such mental distress, without any of the typical experiences of those traditionally diagnosed with PTSD.

Mental illness and trauma disorders are different in that "trauma is explicitly defined as a responsive action to a negative external stressor":

Trauma, and the mental illness most closely associated with it (PTSD), are therefore closely linked to broader societal conditions. If there is a significant uptake in young people identifying themselves as traumatised, it stands to reason there is a significant stressor embedded in wider culture.

And that advanced societies generally are not healthy is clear from the United Kingdom statistics Coburn provides: 

It is not healthy to have 1 in 8 [adults] seeking out professional mental help, nor for 17% of the adult population to be hooked on powerful anti-depressant drugs with nasty side effects. 

The Children's Society in the United Kingdom gives this information:

In the last three years, the likelihood of young people having a mental health problem has increased by 50%. Now, five children in a classroom of 30 are likely to have a mental health problem. 

It continues that 17 to 22 year old women are the group most at risk of developing a mental health problem, adding:

Given the prevalence of mental health problems in children and young people, it's no surprise that psychotherapists on TikTok have amassed millions of followers and likes over the past year.

Coburn concludes her article:

We should be concerned that young people pathologise their dissatisfaction with modern life, adapting in unhealthy ways to untenable societal conditions. Falling back on "trauma" as a catch-all explainer doesn’t bring us closer to a genuine solution.

To determine solutions, scrutiny of causes of distress among young people is imperative. A book just out examines their condition from the frontline perspective of California teacher Jeremy Adams, a National Teacher of the Year nominee.

In Hollowed Out: A Warning About America’s Next Generation:

Adams frets that today’s youngsters are “barren of the behavior, values and hopes from which human beings have traditionally found higher meaning … or even simple contentment.” 

[He] calls them “hollowed out,” a generation living solitary lives, hyperconnected to technology but unattached from their families, churches or communities. He cites statistics showing teen depression rose 63 percent from 2007 to 2017 while teen suicide grew 56 percent. Tragically, he writes, suicide has become the second leading cause of death for the young. 

Adams blames the dissolution of the American family for this [...], with marriage rates down and the number of traditional two-parent homes plummeting. Although studies have shown that regular family dinners leads to less youth “smoking, binge drinking, marijuana use, violence, school problems, eating disorders and sexual activity,” most of Adams’ students say they eat dinner alone each night, focused not on family but the device in their hand. 

“The neglect of family life is one of the greatest causes of the hollowing out not only of students, but of American life,” Adams writes.

Hollowed Out highlights the lack of general awareness of young people, especially about political affairs and civics. But Adams also finds a big shift in the practice of religious life:

While only 2 percent of Americans identified themselves as “atheists” in 1984, that number was 22 percent by 2020. A college religion professor notes that when he discusses Matthew from the Bible, many students think he’s talking about Matthew Perry of Friends. And Luke? His students assume it’s the guy from Beverly Hills, 90210. 

Religion has been replaced by “a mass culture of ‘banality, conformity, and self-indulgence,’” Adams writes, not to mention an obsession with technology. He notes that in the 1970s, more than 50 percent of high schoolers hung out with friends “every day,” but by 2020, that number had dropped below 33 percent.

Modern high schoolers regularly forgo traditional activities like Friday night football games to hunker down alone, “watching Netflix, Hulu, or Disney+.” That helps explain why in 2012, 49 percent of teens ranked “in person” as their favourite way to talk, but in 2018, only 32 percent did. 

Young people's use of technology - smart devices - certainly is a central factor in the general malaise of  the population. One of the points Adams makes is:

Studies show the average Gen Z student uses five electronic devices and has an 8-second attention span, which results in “lower grades, diminished ability to concentrate, and stunted academic achievement”. 

Two other statistics from Hollowed Out illustrate the overall problem:

} In 2014, a US general was quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying “the quality of people willing to serve has been declining rapidly,” with 71 percent of current 17- to 24-year-olds ineligible due to obesity, criminal records, or mental health or drug issues.

} A survey found that while 70 percent of senior citizens could pass a US citizenship test, less than 20 percent of those under 45 could.  

Based on the evidence he provides, Adams concludes:

We need to brace ourselves for what lies ahead. I write this book as an alarm bell … a project born out of worry, concern and frustration. 

In identifying solutions, we can pick up some of the factors that Adams highlights as hollowing out the generation that is now entering their twenties. Chief on his list are:

} Instability in family life, and a lack of religious upbringing, both of which have a bearing on the lack of awareness of moral values such as respect for others, but also on the lack of a sense of self-esteem - within the family and as a valued child of God;

} No respect for learning in the widest sense. Families have abandoned the search for knowledge, but simply want "passing the test" to be made easy. Ideological pressures such as Critical Race Theory are also lowering standards and creating turbulence in the school setting;

} Overuse of electronic devices and social media; which lead to:

} Lack of opportunities to develop personal relationships - in person;

} Lack of opportunities to exercise, which also affects the building of social relationships, and bad eating habits.  

Adams, like Coburn, has a grave concern for the well-being of young people, so commonly seen in the shape of the suffering individual. But both acknowledge the impact on society as a whole, with Coburn highlighting the present "untenable societal conditions", and Adams seeing "America's decline" gathering pace without concerted action by the older generations who are leading their descendants up a dead-end gulch.

This is the time that parents and politicians alike must show courage in putting in place whatever measure they can - it's an incremental process of protection and innovation - to endow the next generations with those personal attributes and social assets which comprise the common good. Once again it is so clear where we are at: "What do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?"

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Do bare boobs spell an end to modesty?

Senior Guardian fashion writer Lauren Cochrane predicts that women's fashion is reaching the tipping point where the concept of modesty will be abandoned altogether. The subject of her article is the cut-down version of a cardigan where the "two curtains of the top are held across the wearer’s breasts by a safety pin or a tiny piece of string". Apparently, there is a fashion statement in a woman's having her breasts largely exposed.

Cochrane explains:

Curtain reveal tops are part of a wider trend in fashion for clothes that reveal breasts in ways beyond typical Wonderbra-style cleavage. If the Kardashians’ wearing bikini tops upside down was spotted on Instagram earlier this year, Love Island has brought this experimentation into living rooms nationwide. Contestants Millie Court and Faye Winter regularly wear open blazers and shirts without anything underneath and – presumably – strategically placed tape keeping their modesty intact, while so-called “underboob” swimwear is worn by all female contestants.

The article quotes Hannah Banks-Walker, the fashion and beauty director at Grazia, on the revealing underboob swimwear:

She suggests this is part of a bigger shift. “Fashion went through that period of shying away from anything that could be deemed remotely sexy and dresses became oversized,” she says. “I think now we’re definitely seeing a return to that sex appeal, unapologetically.” 

So, here we have it: these fashion experts state that there is a trend that encourages women to reveal most of their body in order to look sexy or for sex appeal. Further, that the news and entertainment media cultivate this trend.

Let me say immediately that women should be positive about their body, but my question is, why must women try to be sexy, to exude sex appeal in a public setting? A second question is, what do women think is the effect in men?

On this, I quote a Chinese writer of the 1920s who mocked his fellow males for their reaction to women as emancipation brought about changes in hairstyle and clothing:

The sight of women's short sleeves at once make them think of bare arms, of the naked body, the genitals, copulation, promiscuity, and bastards.

Men do have powerful sexual instincts that women should recognise as part of reality. Men have to learn to restrain themselves, but, without encroaching on victim shaming, women should not be provocative, rather show restraint themselves. As it often plays out in real life - from the gospels:

Everyone looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Mt 5:28)

Restraint is a central element when it comes to modesty. One definition of modesty is: restrained by a sense of seemliness. In turn, seemliness is defined as what is fitting or suitable for the situation.

It would pay us all to refresh our thoughts on what the classical concept of modesty is all about, and why it is valuable to society as a virtue alongside generosity, patience, loyalty and so on.

First, look at these aphorisms:

🔆Modesty isn't about covering your body; it's about revealing your dignity.

🔆 What attracts a man's attention doesn't always attract his respect.

For good order in society we should focus on the body as integral to the dignity of the human person. If a person, by their behaviour or appearance allows the body, even unintentionally, to detract from their dignity, that is a personal failure but also a fault borne by the society that condones such a failure.

We are in this together, not as a collection of individuals who will only to satisfy their own desires, but as a community that protects the welfare of all.  

For the Christian, a sense of the dignity of the person is usually well-embedded. "Each person is obliged to regard their body as good and to hold it in honour since God has created it", and "we are made in the image of God", says the Catechism of the Catholic Church (#364). 

 See this video on how one woman deals with modest but smart clothing.  To watch, click here

The Catholic Church declares that modesty "protects the mystery of persons" and that it is directed to building committed relationships. Modesty..."encourages patience and moderation..." 

This is a worthwhile insight:

The forms taken by modesty vary from one culture to another. Everywhere, however, modesty exists as an intuition of the spiritual dignity proper to the human person. It is born with the awakening consciousness of being a subject. Teaching modesty to children and adolescents means awakening in them respect for the human person. (#2524) 

And this:

Modesty isn’t the end goal - the person is. ... Our bodies and our souls are entirely intertwined. ... Fashion tells someone something about you before you even speak!  (Source)

The wish to be a subject and not an object is what we hear from women, but they allow themselves to be enticed into being little more than sex objects. Women complain about the voyeurism of pornography, of advertising, but do little to resist the pressures from the fashion world to keep up with influencers and trend-setters in presenting themselves in public in just the way they elsewhere think offensive.

See how the fashion magazines use, even abuse, women for their own financial gain. Cochrane tells how Vogue's use of photos of celebrities has propelled the pin-top innovation that seems to surprise her, telling how explicit photos from the Kardashian clan in that same magazine has launched another type of bare body fashion.

The main problem seems to be that a misunderstanding of "freedom" has taken hold since the sexual revolution of the 1960s. That it was a true revolution, that is a concrete departure from a previous order of thought and behaviour, has been confirmed by the ripple effects still playing out in society heaping damage on marriage and the family especially, with subsequent damage to the mental health of the young generations.

The idea of freedon in the context of how we should dress and behave needs some revision. It's a matter of "freedom to" rather than "freedom from". So-called moral permissiveness rests on an erroneous conception of human freedom - only when we have built up self-control and knowledge of our impulses can we say we are free. Otherwise, we are driven this way or that by whoever wields influence in our lives at any particular time.

In Britain at present there are public concerns about rape culture at certain universities and about the need for young girls to wear shorts under their school uniform skirts. Many parents are horrified at the way young males are treating their daughters. They should be asking why males have learnt to regard girls and women with such contempt that they fail to show the necessary respect.  

Obviously, we need an alternative approach to women feeling they have to bare their body in order to make a noise for their photo to appear on social media and celebrity websites. See the British tabloids like the Daily Mail for its daily line-up of near naked women and, lately, the use of Billie Eilish to sell copies of British Vogue.

Lillian Fallon is a freelance writer in Philadelphia. Previously working as the style editor at Verily Magazine, she is "passionate about exploring the connection between the physical and interior of the human person as seen through personal style".

She says that showing who you are is what fashion is for. There is a lot fun involved in getting an outfit together so that you look elegant or spunky or whatever. But the point is to not let others determine how you should look:

The fast fashion industry warps the visual connection between the external and internal of the human person as expressed through our clothing by telling us that 1). You must buy into trends to be relevant, and 2). Your individuality doesn’t matter and you need to fit in. But there will never be anyone else like you — you are unrepeatable. Why not choose clothing that represents this? 

About three and a half years ago, I made the switch to building an ethical wardrobe and to completely stop shopping fast fashion. I had started seeing the growing connection between the fast fashion industry and the cultural diminishment of personal style and [...] of the human person in general.

It’s important to remember that clothing should express our self-worth, not define it. To stay in check, I try not to give into the pressure to look “perfect” all the time. When I get dressed, I make sure that creativity is my goal — not perfection. Being creative means being okay with outfits that end up being weirder than you anticipated (I once accidentally dressed like Peter Pan.) Also, if I have days where I just don’t feel like putting together a super amazing outfit, that’s totally okay. Regardless of what I’m wearing, my worth as a woman made in the image of God can never change.

Disorder in society arises when principles and passions are led astray. As human beings, men and women are always battling the innate impulses that cause us to rebel against our better selves. When they dress to impress, both men and women have to consider the condition of the other sex to allow people to mix in such a way that they truly encounter each other, generating harmony rather than a distracting internal struggle. That's what modesty is all about.

Read for yourself the Christian perspective on modesty. Go here. 

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Income inequality is increasingly cruel

Private jet travel is "way over the top" this year at Aspen.  Molly Briggs/Aspen Daily News

Christopher Ingraham of The Washington Post highlighted late last year the extraordinary statistic that if Amazon executive chair Jeff Bezos gave all his employees a US$105,000 bonus he would still have more wealth than he did at the start of the pandemic.

That factoid came from an Oxfam report that arose from observing around the world, but most starkly in the United States, that  “windfall” profits flowed to a small number of very large businesses whose products and services have been in high demand during the pandemic.

Oxfam saw this phenomenon aggravating the inequality evident everywhere: 

The worsening inequality crisis triggered by Covid-19 is fuelled by an economic model that has allowed some of the world's largest corporations to funnel billions of dollars in profits to shareholders. At the same time, it has left low-wage workers and women to pay the price of the pandemic without social or financial protection.

That economic model is not inevitable - it's a result of decisions taken by those who hold corporate and political power. 

Bloomberg writer Anders Melin has been tracking the short-sighted corporate behaviour furthering inequality (see here and here), He reports the reaction to last Wednesday's action by senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren to lodge a bill that would use a tax mechanism to discourage companies from "paying CEOs lavishly and workers feebly":

The proposal is a long shot given Washington’s political gridlock and broad disagreement about how income inequality should be addressed—or whether it’s even a matter in need of fixing. But if enacted, it would hit most of the biggest U.S. companies.

The typical CEO among the 1,000 biggest publicly traded firms in the country receives 144 times more than their median employee, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. 

Walmart Inc., for instance, has a CEO-to-worker pay ratio of 983:1, with the median person receiving $22,484.

At Coca-Cola Co., the ratio is 1,621:1; GameStop Corp., the company at the center of  this year’s stock trading frenzy, has a ratio of 1,137:1 with its median worker getting $11,129.

Sanders said at a Congressional hearing Wednesday that anybody who works 40 hours a week shouldn’t have to live in poverty.

“It has always been true, of course, that CEOs make more than their employees,” he said. “But what has been going on in recent years is totally absurd.”

Ingraham picked up some of the key points from Oxfam:

The Oxfam report identifies mechanisms by which major companies have “exacerbated the economic impacts” of Covid-19.

Chief among them is the long-standing tendency of many large companies to prioritise shareholder payouts over employee wages, which has continued even as millions of workers have been laid off during the pandemic.

From 2010 to 2019, companies listed in the Standard & Poor's 500 index spent US$9.1 trillion on payouts to their wealthiest shareholders – equalling more than 90 per cent of their profits over the same period, the report said. “Several companies not only paid out all of their profits to shareholders, they sometimes went into debt or used reserves to pay their rich investors.”

Because the wealthiest 10 per cent of Americans own more than 80 per cent of the stock market, these massive payouts are a key driver of the skyrocketing wealth inequality in this country. They also set many companies up to have little financial cushion to soften the blow of the coronavirus recession, contributing to the mass layoffs and even to the shortages of medical and personal protective equipment that have plagued the US response.

"Decision-making by corporate managers has become disconnected from any sense of community or national obligation"

Oxfam said the payouts are continuing even during the public health crisis. Focusing on recent earnings statements for the 25 most profitable S&P Global 100 countries, they found that they are expected to distribute a “shocking” 124 per cent of their net profits to shareholders this year [2020]. And many companies continue to funnel cash to shareholders even as they lay off their workers.

The continued flow of shareholder payouts during the economic and public health crises “underscores the degree to which decision-making by corporate managers has become disconnected from any sense of community or national obligation,” said Oren Cass, a former senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and the director of American Compass, a think tank advocating for what Cass calls a “pro-worker conservatism”.

According to the report, the 32 most profitable companies globally – including Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon and others – are expected to collectively pull in profits totaling US$109b above their average annual haul, according to the companies' earnings statements. In July [2020], the chief executives of all four companies were peppered with questions about their profits and business practices during a House antitrust hearing.

The state of the business world mirrors the moral state in most societies. The "absurd" imbalance in pay levels show how the values of a few decades ago that stressed the importance of a sense of community have deteriorated, and business people have grown casually cruel out of habit - perhaps Gordon Gekko's "greed is good" code has fully taken hold.

In that light, Amazon's anti-union efforts besmirch a company I find very convenient in buying from. I will take my business away if instances of such efforts continue to surface. Of course, Amazon is not alone in fighting to prevent workers gaining a platform for securing a bettter deal with pay and benefits.

I think this is where progressives in advanced economies have got on to a morally bankrupt path by pursuing culture issues like "white privilege" and "human rights" that satisfy loud campaigners dealing with sexual matters that ignore reality and, in fact, run heavily against the family. 

Here's a statement I came across recently in a book dealing with China's struggle in the early 20th Century to modernise. I see weak-minded Western progressives very clearly in these words:

If you demand political rights you will not be met with much opposition, whereas if you speak about the equal distribution of wealth you will find yourself up against real enemies.

John Harwood of CNBC has some pertinent remarks:

The rise of income inequality and the struggles of so many families to get ahead have shaken American politics across the spectrum.

President Donald Trump invokes the plight of “the forgotten people.” Liberals call for massive new government programs.

Wall Street titan Jamie Dimon proposes “a Marshall Plan for America.” Ideological conservatives warn of a socialist uprising that would ruin American capitalism.

But economists who study the issue say it need not come to that. With bold and targeted steps, they argue, government can increase opportunity and incomes for many more people in ways that strengthen, not weaken, American capitalism.

He goes on to list five ways to fight wealth inequality. It's well worth a read to get an insight into the possibilities available for lifting millions out of a decidedly stressful condition in life. Action is well overdue, and public support at all levels is needed in order for the common good to be achieved. The US infrastructure legislation is a necessary first step and it needs to be replicated widely. But social welfare programmes are also essential.  

Read Harwood's solutions to our predicament that entraps a horrendous number, and see an earlier post titled "Morals and markets and outlandish CEO pay" (here), as well as the related post "Morals and markets and the common good" (here). 

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China shows that inequality is not inevitable

Migrant workers Sun Chang Jie and Li Ting show the children they left behind. (Source)

Economic policies that allow the rich to get richer on the monumental hope that resources will trickle down to the poor - and the middle class - have been widely challenged, but there has been contemptibly inadequate action by governments. 

A positive sign had been that the British government of the traditionally "austerity" party had largely dumped that policy, even before it became apparent with the Covid outbreak that the state's smoothing of income was imperative. But there has been little movement beyond that. In addition, Donald Trump campaigned on taking action to rein in the 1 per cent reaping the bulk of value society as a whole was generating, but betrayed his supporters by cutting tax only for the rich elite and doing little else to lift the living conditions of the bulk of society.

So it is gratifying to observe this week how China is leading the way in the world to actively launch policies that compel high-wealth citizens and the biggest companies, particular the huge tech entities, to contribute in a more socially responsible way to the goal of diminishing the inequality that sits as a ticking bomb at the base of most developed nations.

This commitment to strengthen the common good shows that gross inequality is not inevitable, and a society that understands solidarity will make the accommodation necessary to participate in the necessary redistribution of resources.

The Business Standard reports:

At Tuesday’s meeting of the Communist Party’s Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs, the government detailed new strategies to target the [social elite]. Officials vowed to “strengthen the regulation and adjustment of high income, protect legal income, reasonably adjust excessive income, and encourage high-income groups and enterprises to give back to society more.”  

As Fortune put it:

Chinese President Xi Jinping vowed this week to "adjust excessive incomes," putting the nation's super-rich on notice that the state is preparing to combat economic inequality by redistributing private wealth. 

The South China Morning Post in Hong Kong quoted state media as saying "this means the country would focus on moderate wealth for all, rather than just a few". Companies would be expected to make funds available for social purposes, but on the business side new rules could control speculation through property and inheritance taxes, and target anticompetitive practices by internet companies 

A day after this announcement the tech giant Tencent Holdings said it had set aside US$7.7 billion to pursue the government's goal for "social prosperity". 

Morgan Stanley analysts said in a report Wednesday the goal was “to increase the middle-income group’s share of the economy.” The report adds:

Elaborating on the ‘common prosperity’ objective, China has affirmed its effort to rebalance the economy toward labor, tackling social inequality with redistribution, social welfare, taxes and inclusive education. 

That reference to education is linked to the crackdown on the high fees charged by private tutoring companies. It was becoming too much of a drain on families to send their children to the extra classes needed, so the poor were shut out.

Tencent said its ads business only grew 5 per cent from the previous quarter as a result of “reduced spending by companies providing after-school tutoring due to regulatory changes”. 

The news reports tell how the government is aware of some impact on growth but the impetus to act comes from the mounting inequality of incomes. "The lower-earning half of the population has seen its share of national income fall to about 15%, down from about 27% in 1978," according to CNBC.

The Business Standard elaborates:

“China’s wealth and income inequality has worsened to such a serious level that policy makers have no choice but to face it and make addressing it a priority,” said Larry Hu, head of Greater China economics at Macquarie Group in Hong Kong. Xi’s meeting “brought the issue to the highest level” and is an important signal of future policy direction, he said.

Carol Liao, China economist at Pimco Asia, said capital gains taxes are also an option, as well as other measures to improve income distribution, like enhancing social security programs, providing incentives for charity [the social prospeity fund, for example] and more government transfers to less developed regions.

At Xi’s meeting, officials pledged to provide conditions for people to enhance their education and move up the income ladder. They also called for promoting the equal access to public services by improving housing supply, elderly care and the medical system.

The government identified the eastern province of Zhejiang, home to Alibaba Group and known for its robust private sector, as a pilot zone for the new initiatives.

Last month, Zhejiang released detailed plans for raising per capita disposable income to 75,000 yuan ($11,563) by 2025, which would be a 45% increase within five years. It also wants wages to account for more than half of its gross domestic product, and to lift its urbanization rate to 75%.

To achieve those goals, the provincial government will encourage workers to bargain collectively for wages; listed companies to raise cash dividends to shareholders; and farmers to pursue entrepreneurship strategies. It will also promote the development of financial products to benefit residents.

The road map also said the government will better protect the rights of those in new forms of employment, including delivery workers and drivers working for ride-hailing companies, and implement tax benefits for philanthropic donations.

It’s also worth noting that Tencent and its subsidiaries have been pushed to reduce the time young people can play video games. 

The Chinese government's strength of purpose presents a model for all countries in showing courage against the usual powerful interests in rebalancing the world's over-flowing inventory of disordered economies.

Ω For more on this topic of morals and the market, go here and here

Ω If you like this blog, go to my Peace and Truth newsletter on Substack, where you can subscribe for free and be notified when a new post is published.

Scientists struggle along without arriving at certainty

Given the vise-like hold science has over the thinking of much of society, I like to scan scientific publications to gain insights into what scientists and academic types say about their own domain. Of course, science is a boon to the well-being of society, but along with that goes the legacy of rationalist thinkers who blew much of the treasure of a rich civilisation, leaving us a threadbare wardrobe of consumerism, individualism and lack of direction.

The writer of a Scientific American article just out (see here) is an agnostic - both as to belief in God and what science can prove - who digs into the "theories that try to explain [all the] big metaphysical mysteries",  quantum mechanics being one of those theories. This is the key point: Despite the impression you get from public intellectuals who tend to argue that they have the world neatly packaged, science writer John Horgan finds that scientists are often skeptical that the full truth can be found in their work. 

Here are the writer's credentials that run with the article:

John Horgan directs the Center for Science Writings at the Stevens Institute of Technology [a private research university in New Jersey]. His books include The End of Science, The End of War and Mind-Body Problems. For many years, he wrote the immensely popular blog Cross Check for Scientific American. 

To quickly highlight some of the points Horgan makes, a good place to start is with "the problem of suffering" - and with the "problem of beauty". For Horgan, suffering is a closed case, supporting his skepticism about God. Beauty is another matter. 

He states: "We experience love, friendship, adventure and heartbreaking beauty. Could all this really come from random collisions of particles?" He also reports that the prominent physicist Steven Weinberg, an atheist, who died in July, had conceded that life sometimes seems “more beautiful than strictly necessary”. In fact, it’s interesting how often scientists, particularly physicists and mathematicians, describe the laws and other features of their field as beautiful.

In dealing with another of his "problems", Horgan examines quantum mechanics and finds the theory wanting:

Quantum mechanics is science’s most precise, powerful theory of reality. It has predicted countless experiments, spawned countless applications. The trouble is, physicists and philosophers disagree over what it means, that is, what it says about how the world works. Many physicists—most, probably—adhere to the Copenhagen interpretation, advanced by Danish physicist Niels Bohr. But that is a kind of anti-interpretation, which says physicists should not try to make sense of quantum mechanics; they should “shut up and calculate”, as physicist David Mermin once put it.

To continue:

Philosopher Tim Maudlin deplores this situation. In his 2019 book Philosophy of Physics: Quantum Theory, he points out that several interpretations of quantum mechanics describe in detail how the world works. [...] But here’s the irony: Maudlin is so scrupulous in pointing out the flaws of these interpretations that he reinforces my skepticism. They all seem hopelessly kludgy and preposterous. 

Maudlin does not examine interpretations that recast quantum mechanics as a theory about information. [...] But to my mind, information-based takes on quantum mechanics are even less plausible than the interpretations that Maudlin scrutinizes. The concept of information makes no sense without conscious beings to send, receive and act upon the information.

Introducing consciousness into physics undermines its claim to objectivity. Moreover, as far as we know, consciousness arises only in certain organisms that have existed for a brief period here on Earth. So how can quantum mechanics, if it’s a theory of information rather than matter and energy, apply to the entire cosmos since the big bang? Information-based theories of physics seem like a throwback to geocentrism, which assumed the universe revolves around us. [...]

Another sticking point for Horgan is science's quandary over of the "mind-body problem":

The debate over consciousness is even more fractious than the debate over quantum mechanics. How does matter make a mind? A few decades ago, a consensus seemed to be emerging. Philosopher Daniel Dennett, in his cockily titled Consciousness Explained, asserted that consciousness clearly emerges from neural processes, such as electrochemical pulses in the brain. Francis Crick and Christof Koch proposed that consciousness is generated by networks of neurons oscillating in synchrony.

Gradually, this consensus collapsed, as empirical evidence for neural theories of consciousness failed to materialize. As I point out in my recent book Mind-Body Problems, there are now a dizzying variety of theories of consciousness. Christof Koch has thrown his weight behind integrated information theory, which holds that consciousness might be a property of all matter, not just brains. This theory suffers from the same problems as information-based theories of quantum mechanics. Theorists such as Roger Penrose, who won last year’s Nobel Prize in Physics, have conjectured that quantum effects underpin consciousness, but this theory is even more lacking in evidence than integrated information theory.

Researchers cannot even agree on what form a theory of consciousness should take. Should it be a philosophical treatise? A purely mathematical model? A gigantic algorithm, perhaps based on Bayesian computation? Should it borrow concepts from Buddhism, such as anatta, the doctrine of no self? All of the above? None of the above? Consensus seems farther away than ever. And that’s a good thing. We should be open-minded about our minds.

Horgan has long been exploring the realms of what is knowable and unknowable, but his conclusion for this latest effort is: 

I’m definitely a skeptic. I doubt we’ll ever know whether God exists, what quantum mechanics means, how matter makes mind. These three puzzles, I suspect, are different aspects of a single, impenetrable mystery at the heart of things. But one of the pleasures of agnosticism—perhaps the greatest pleasure—is that I can keep looking for answers and hoping that a revelation awaits just over the horizon.

God is at the heart of things, and it has been the Catholic position that, using our reason, we can know the existence of God. This has been consistent from Paul (Romans 1:19-20), through the 5th Century's Augustine and the 13th Century's Thomas Aquinas, and the magisterium of the Church expressed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (source):

Created in God's image and called to know and love Him, the person who seeks God discovers certain ways of coming to know Him. These are also called proofs for the existence of God, not in the sense of proofs in the natural sciences, but rather in the sense of "converging and convincing arguments", which allow us to attain certainty about the truth. (31)

For example, since Horgan talked of the beauty of life as a counterargument to the problem of pain, we can take Augustine's demonstration of knowledge of God from the beauty of creation. Augustine writes:

Question the beauty of the earth, question the beauty of the sea, question the beauty of the air distending and diffusing itself, question the beauty of the sky...question all these realities. All respond: "See, we are beautiful." Their beauty is a [statement] (confessio). However, these beauties are subject to change. Who made them if not the Beautiful One (Pulcher) who is not subject to change?

That's just one way that the existence of God can be accepted as a reasonable proposition. We can also draw from the nature of the human person a knowledge of our transcendence, and of God as the origin and end of the universe.

The human person: With their openness to truth and beauty, their sense of moral goodness, their freedom and the voice of their conscience, with their longing for the infinite and for happiness, the person questions themself about God's existence. [The debate over atheism is itself a sign of the existence of God.] In all these ways mentioned the person discerns signs of their spiritual soul. The soul, the "seed of eternity we bear in ourselves, irreducible to the merely material," can have its origin only in God. (Adapted from CCC 33) 

For another statement on the natural proofs for the existence of the soul, go here.

In all this, we have to recognise the obstacles to accepting the demonstrations from creation and from the nature of the person:

The truths that concern the relations between God and the person wholly transcend the visible order of things, and, if they are translated into human action and influence, they call for self-surrender and abnegation.  The human mind, in its turn is hampered in the attaining of such truths, not only by the impact of the senses and imagination, but also by disordered appetites. ... So it happens that the person easily persuades themself that what they would not like to be true is false or at least doubtful. (CCC 37) 

Unfortunately, this last element is what we see often within the scientific community, where scientists are immersed in an atmosphere of dismissal of anything not material, and so they do not even consider options that cannot be measured but rather are to be observed. Horgan has a telling testimony in his article, citing Francis Collins, a geneticist who directs the U.S. National Institutes of Health. He is a Christian, and in his 2006 book The Language of God, he calls agnosticism a “cop-out.” 

Horgan quotes Collins as telling him:

That was a put-down that should not apply to earnest agnostics who have considered the evidence and still don’t find an answer. I was reacting to the agnosticism I see in the scientific community, which has not been arrived at by a careful examination of the evidence.  

Therefore, science is by its nature an uncertain domain, but it worsens its condition when it allows itself to be a blinkered activity that does not examine reality in all its fullness. In that case, it will fail to be of service to humanity, and, in fact, will take humanity down paths that give rise to disorder and regret.

Ω For a good discussion about uncertainty in science, go here.

Ω If you like this blog, go to my Peace and Truth newsletter on Substack, where you can subscribe for free and be notified when a new post is published.

The good news as Covid changes lives

Families together again for the thick and thin - becoming part of the post-Covid mindset

The good news is that people have been making a radical reassessment of their lives, making decisions about what is most important among all the priorities that press upon them in normal times. In other words, they are being brave in distinguishing between the wheat and the chaff of life.

The headlines have been saying it for more than a year as Covid-19 took a grip all around the world. "Families reunite in pandemic and rethink what home means", says the Washington Post; "COVID-19 brings some families closer together, as bonds strengthen in times of crisis" - Canadian TV: "While pandemic-related restrictions have separated many families, some Canadians are reuniting with relatives to support each other through the crisis, often rekindling bonds that had perhaps been neglected in the bustle of pre-lockdown life." 

Also, the independence that older people claimed in encouraging their children to move out, or in moving themselves to retire "gracefully" without the "bother" of attending to grandchildren, has been found to be a mistake: "Baby Boomers, Isolated During Covid, Rushed to Move Close to Their Kids", says the Wall Street Journal.

Living conditions in some cities, tolerated but a cause of  disquiet, have also undergone a fresh look:

"More than 40% of people in large European cities have considered moving away due to the new coronavirus pandemic, ... with Londoners most prone to dreaming of living in a smaller town with better access to parks and other amenities," according to a Thomson Reuters story. It went on:

Half of urban dwellers in London, Paris, Milan, Madrid and Berlin said lockdowns had made them more concerned about overcrowding and air pollution, according to the poll by British engineering firm Arup. [...] People have re-evaluated the importance of living near essential services like shops and green spaces. 

Certainly it is great to see families undertaking an audit of their lives. However, I am most heartened to learn about the large numbers of knowledge workers who are shedding the pressures of what might be regarded as a trendy, even sophisticated lifestyle, for one where simplicity allows a return to the very real and more satisfying simpler pleasures of life, which include time for leisure, a tight community, and an escape from "corporate think".

The New Yorker has an article that comprehensively examines this development. It states:

In early June, the Labor Department released a report that revealed a record four million Americans had quit their jobs in April alone—part of a phenomenon that news outlets called “The Great Resignation.” 

Though the reasons for this pandemic-related behaviour are complex and affect workers in multiple sectors of  the economy, there is a clear link with what is happening in the knowledge sector:

These people are generally well-educated workers who are leaving their jobs not because the pandemic created obstacles to their employment but, at least in part, because it nudged them to rethink the role of work in their lives altogether. Many are embracing career downsizing, voluntarily reducing their work hours to emphasize other aspects of life.

These kinds of workers are prepared to "downshift", to have a lower income in order to reduce the pace of their life, and to end the stupidity of driving themselves into the ground for the sake of status in its various forms.

What is most heartening about the outcome of the self-scrutiny of this group is that they can have a big impact on the mentality of society into the future:

These downsizing knowledge workers represent only one piece of the Great Resignation, and their choices certainly earn disclaimers about privilege, but they seem worth monitoring, because they represent a group that wields outsized economic and cultural influence. 

This group can go a long way towards reshaping society, ridding developed countries of the some of the misery hidden under a veneer of wealth, relative or not. The materialism and its consequent way of life are then less likely to be admired and absorbed by the younger generations of emerging nations.

The New Yorker provides an analysis that rings true:

Many well-compensated but burnt-out knowledge workers have long felt that their internal ledger books were out of balance: they worked long hours, they made good money, they had lots of stuff, they were exhausted, and, above all, they saw no easy options for changing their circumstances. Then came shelter-in-place orders and shuttered office buildings. This particular class of workers were thrown into their own Zoom-equipped versions of Walden Pond [by Henry David Thoreau].

Diversion and entertainment were stripped down to basic forms, and it became difficult to spend more than the cost of a Netflix subscription or batch of sourdough starter to keep occupied. The absence of visits with friends and family reinforced the value of social connection. The unceasing presence of video conferencing and e-mail enhanced the Kafkaesque superfluousness of many of the activities that dominated the pre-pandemic workday. 

The only logical thing to do was to flee the craziness, physically or through a thorough lifestyle revamp.

While the author of this piece hedges on a prediction as to whether this phenomenon is set to survive any "return to normalcy", it does offer a shaft of hope that people are willing to reflect and act when their own welfare and that of their family are endangered by the disoriented culture that governs most societies.

Ω See another post on this topic here

Ω If you like this blog, go to my Peace and Truth newsletter on Substack, where you can subscribe for free and be notified when a new post is published.

More Nobel scientists join Catholic academy

Emmanuelle Charpentier: credit - Bianca Fioretti of Hallbauer & Fioretti; and Jennifer Doudna: credit - Duncan.Hull and The Royal Society. CC BY-SA 4.0 Wikimedia

 Two more Nobel Prize winning scientists have been appointed to the Catholic Church's advisory scientific body. They are the co-inventors of the CRISPR genome editing technology. 

Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna discovered CRISPR about 10 years ago, sparking research into new treatments for cancer and other diseases, earning them the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

The technology simplifies the editing of human DNA, allowing scientists to use an enzyme called Cas9 to “cut and paste” gene sequences. 

This has been applied to experimental treatments for sickle cell anemia and certain cancers, but has also raised bioethical concerns, including its application in “designer babies.”

Rome-based journalist Courtney Mares offers some background to the Pontical Sciences Academy appointments, made under the auspices of the pope: 

One of the current members, who are known as "ordinary academicians," is Francis Collins, who led the Human Genome Project and is the director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

Past members included Stephen Hawking and scores of Nobel Prize-winning scientists, such as Guglielmo Marconi, Max Planck, Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, and Erwin Schrödinger.

Religious belief – Catholic or otherwise – is not a criterion for membership in the pontifical academy. This open membership policy exists because the Pontifical Academy is conceived as a place where science and faith can meet and discuss. It is not a confessional forum, but a place where it is possible to have an open discussion and examine scientific developments.

Mares' article also gives more detail on the ethical issues arising from the gene-editing capability, so it's worth a read.

Ω If you like this blog, go to my Peace and Truth newsletter on Substack, where you can subscribe for free and be notified when a new post is published.

High screen use, low life-satisfaction

Girls, especially, suffer from tech dis-ease. Photo by Julia M Cameron, from Pexels

A new set of evidence has come in on the abhorrent influence of tech devices and social media on young people, demonstrating again that parents and society as a whole must confront the problem of unsupervised access.

Research published in The Lancet found detrimental mental health impacts start after two hours of screen use for girls and after four hours for boys.

Screen use included television, video games and social media, but excluded screen time for school study. 

The research involved more than 577,000 children aged between 11 and 15 from 42 high-income countries, and it was conducted well before the pandemic altered our lifestyles. The last sample for the study is from 2014, so the impact of screen time on adolescents is likely to have become more pronounced since the early days of social media. 

The study's lead author, Dr Asad Khan, from Australia's University of Queensland School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, said they measured life satisfaction and  "psychosomatic" health, being where physical illness or other condition is caused or aggravated by a mental factor.

Khan said of the team's findings: 

What we found was that mental health is a big issue. We have also started seeing evidence coming through the scientific literature that overuse of screen time for recreation is also causing some issues in academic achievement, attention and other psychosocial problems like attention deficiency disorder syndrome.

We have also seen that it is linked with depression and anxiety in this particular paediatric population.

As to why negative mental health impacts kicked in after four hours of screen time for boys, but within half that time for girls, Khan said boys are generally more active with their screen time.

Boys are doing more of active screen time for computer, electronic games, whereas girls are not doing that.

Girls' [active] contribution is really low compared to the boys, so that may be why the passive screen time, which is television and social media, are the dominant component of the girls' screen time.

The study's summary states:

Mental wellbeing in adolescents has declined considerably during past decades, making the identification of modifiable risk factors important. 

Detrimental associations between screen time and mental well-being started when screen time exceeded one hour per day, whereas increases in physical activity levels were beneficially ... associated with well-being.  

Screen time levels were negatively associated with life satisfaction and positively associated with psychosomatic complaints in a dose-dependent manner. Physical activity levels were positively associated with life satisfaction and negatively associated with psychosomatic complaints in a dose-dependent manner.  

That means the more screen time, the worse is youngsters' feeling of well-being, and the more physical activity taken, the better youngsters feel.

The study's conclusion is:

Public health strategies to promote adolescents' mental well-being should aim to decrease screen time and increase physical activity.

That goes for parents' strategies as well! 

The Australian recommendations for parents is limiting electronic screen use to a maximum of two hours a day and encouraging physical activity of at least one hour a day for both boys and girls.

Khan said one hour of physical activity and no more than two hours of screen time a day provided "optimal mental well-being".

We need to recalibrate our kids' behaviour towards a healthier lifestyle, meaning that when we can, [we should] replace the screen time with some outdoor activity.

Targeting both behaviours simultaneously is likely to give us the best benefit.

We are urging parents to actually minimise screen time as well as maximise the physical activity so we could give a better life to our kids.

The data was collected long before the COVID-19 pandemic where dramatic reductions in physical activity and increases in screen time have been observed globally.

...This is a wake-up call for us as parents, as a community, or as a society to look into this and try to help our kids to do more physical activity, to move more and sit less on a screen.

We need to invest in this if we want to see a healthier lifestyle for our kids in the future.

These findings confirm those of a study published late last year in which excessive screen time for young children under five years was found to be more often associated with poor cognitive outcomes, understandable because at that age they're developing cognitive abilities like language.

In adolescents, there was more association between mental health outcomes like depression and anxiety.

This second study focused on the benefits to children of getting some "green-time", concluding:

Nature may be an under-utilised public health resource for youth psychological well-being in a high-tech era.

Additional guidance for parents is given in response to both these findings by clinical psychotherapist Victoria Matthews, who works with teenagers and children at her Queensland practice. She urges parents to show their adolescents understanding and compassion.

[Children] stay home, they do their homework, but the socialisation that would happen in person is now online.

It used to be all about peer pressure, but now it's 'FOMO', or fear of missing out. What they fear missing out on is the conversation going past them and them not being involved in it.

It becomes a source of distress for them, because what we're not appreciating is that that's how they now socialise — and we've done that to them.

We do have to come out with some compassion and say, 'We've actually created the situation because we've deprived them of the ability to go out.'

Therefore, sports and other club activities are important for young people to get away from their screens but also have that chance to participate in a variety of "conversations" with peers. Matthews says this gives young people opportunity to build a variety of friendship groups.

They're getting their self-esteem built from interacting with people in multiple environments, not just one. Whereas now they go to school and they're still dealing with all that stuff until 9 o'clock at night.

Without that extra interaction, some may come home and head straight for a screen:

They come home, they lie on the bed, and they're just swiping, swiping, messaging, and swiping. [However,] we can't live a life without tech — we just can't.

If that is the case, then it is because the older generation/s and the self-interested corporate influencers have created the wired world the young generation finds itself in.

Therefore, these same confederates must create a fresh environment to preserve the well-being of the young. It's a serious responsibility that parents, as central figures in the core cell of society, have to accept, starting with the task of forging strong connections with their children so that family standards are set, and constructive habits formed from the youngest years. Parents also have to be the role model.

See other posts on this topic here, here and here.

Ω If you like this blog, go to my Peace and Truth newsletter on Substack, where you can subscribe for free and be notified when a new post is published.

Dr. Carl Trueman: Plastic People, Liquid World

What a sorry state science is in!

Neuroscience has its credibility problems, too. Photo: Anna Shvets at pexels

Science isn't what it's cracked up to be. From the methods used, to the manner in which findings are published, the scientific realm has shown repeatedly that it certainly is in a sorry state. What it comes down to is that research findings as reported cannot be believed! 

The "replication crisis" is the term given to the worrying fact that the conclusions in a large proportion of  studies cannot be reproduced when other scientists try to confirm the original findings. The paper by John Ioannidis in 2005 that sounded the alarm had the astounding title, "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False".

As The Guardian's science editor, Ian Sample, points out, since then "three major projects have found replication rates as low as 39% in psychology journals, 61% in economics journals, and 62% in social science studies published in the Nature and Science, two of the most prestigious journals in the world". 

This is serious stuff:

The influence of an inaccurate paper published in a prestigious journal can have repercussions for decades. For example, the study Andrew Wakefield published in The Lancet in 1998 turned tens of thousands of parents around the world against the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine because of an implied link between vaccinations and autism. The incorrect findings were retracted by The Lancet 12 years later, but the claims that autism is linked to vaccines continue.  (Source)

The new study, by the University of California San Diego's Rady School of Management, was published in the journal Science Advances. Ian Sample states that the study highlights the extent of ongoing reference to the false findings:

Studies in top science, psychology and economics journals that fail to hold up when others repeat them are cited, on average, more than 100 times as often in follow-up papers than work that stands the test of time.

The finding ... has led the authors to suspect that more interesting papers are waved through more easily by reviewers and journal editors and, once published, attract more attention.

Put more clearly:

...findings from studies that cannot be verified when the experiments are repeated have a bigger influence over time. The unreliable research tends to be cited as if the results were true long after the publication [of the experiment that] failed to replicate. [Source]

In addition:

"We also know that experts can predict well which papers will be replicated," write the authors Marta Serra-Garcia, assistant professor of economics and strategy at the Rady School and Uri Gneezy, professor of behavioral economics also at the Rady School. "Given this prediction, we ask 'why are non-replicable papers accepted for publication in the first place?'"

Their possible answer is that review teams of academic journals face a trade-off. When the results are more "interesting," they apply lower standards regarding their reproducibility. [Source]

Take note of the next statement, and then the explanation for giving prominence to what is interesting over what is true:

It has been claimed and demonstrated that many (and possibly most) of the conclusions drawn from biomedical research are probably false. 

A central cause for this important problem is that researchers must publish in order to succeed [in academia], and publishing is a highly competitive enterprise, with certain kinds of findings more likely to be published than others. Research that produces novel results, statistically significant results ... and seemingly 'clean' results is more likely to be published.

As a consequence, researchers have strong incentives to engage in research practices that make their findings publishable quickly, even if those practices reduce the likelihood that the findings reflect a true ... effect. 

The writers of this journal article - it's in Nature and authors include John Ioannidis, cited above - suggest scientists often attempt to game the system in order to achieve high publication numbers against their name to impress superiors.

As Ian Sample states:

The academic system incentivises journals and researchers to publish exciting findings, and citations are taken into account for promotion and tenure. But history suggests that the more dramatic the results, the more likely they are to be wrong.

Methods used can also be fault. The Nature article quoted above is titled,  "Power failure: why small sample size undermines the reliability of neuroscience". Wow! What a mountain of implications that statement sets down in the middle of those who are trying to reconcile the brain/mind conflict that a few scientists loudly promote. 

A further important issue is highlighted in that key Nature article as part of its conclusion.

Small, low-powered studies are endemic in neuroscience. ... Nevertheless, we should not assume that science is effectively or efficiently self-correcting. There is now substantial evidence that a large proportion of the evidence reported in the scientific literature may be unreliable. Acknowledging this challenge is the first step towards addressing the problematic aspects of current scientific practices and identifying effective solutions.

Finally, we need to consider another challenge to the reliability of  what is purported to be a scientific conclusion. And that challenge is wokeism, which arised from the Critical Justice Theory derived from the Frankfurt School's social theory approach in analysing society and the roots of injustice. By way of explanation:

On the political left, wokeness sometimes drifts into wokeism—a system of thought and behavior characterized by intolerance, policing the speech of others, and proving one’s own superiority by denouncing others. 

Within American society especially CJT has taken hold of academia, the mainstream news media, and largely, the Democratic Party. A feature of the American practice of this theory is the soft totalitariansm shown in enforcing its manifesto, which covers the diminishing of the status of the traditional family, and the rejection of the male/female reality of each human person. 

How this affects the reliability of the scientific endeavour was made clear by the capitulation of a heretofore reputable scientific website to the wokeism afflicting the United States. I'm referring to the website Science-Based Medicine, which has betrayed its previously principled goal of "evaluating medical treatments and products of interest to the public in a scientific light, and promoting the highest standards and traditions of science in health care". (Source)

This is what has happened:

If you read the site’s recent coverage..., you will come away thinking there is a big, broad, impressive body of evidence for youth gender medicine, that there isn’t any actual controversy here at all. Rather than evaluate the available evidence carefully, SBM defaults to just about every activist trope that has come to dictate the terms of this debate in progressive spaces. This is a disturbing example of what complete ideological capture of an otherwise credible information source looks like. Science-Based Medicine has “bought into the hype and failed to ask the hard questions”.(Source)

The topic that gave rise to SBM's loss of reputation is "how to best help gender dysphoric children and adolescents — that is, young people who feel a great deal of distress about their biological sex, which they will often (though not always) describe as a sense of profound identity mismatch and/or being “trapped in the wrong body”. (Source)  

This website's meltdown is chronicled by Jesse Singal, who has built up a formidable expertise on this issue. He has written a long account of how SBM's principals ran a book review of Abigail Shrier’s book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters. The reviewer, Dr Harriet Hall, who had written 700 articles on the website, was favourable in her review.

Lo and behold, in response to pushback to the positive review, the principals "decided to retract the review entirely, replacing it with a statement that it had failed to meet SBM’s normal editorial standards and denying that the move was related to political pressure from the SBM community or anyone else".   

Singal states:

SBM has, in the wake of this retraction, published three articles about Shrier, Hall’s review of her book, and the broader controversy over youth gender medicine...

All three articles contain major errors and misunderstandings and distortions, ranging from straightforward falsehoods to baffling omissions to the re-regurgitation of inaccurate rumors first circulated years ago. Activist claims that stretch or violate the truth are repeatedly presented in a credulous manner, while the myriad weaknesses in the research base on youth gender medicine are simply ignored. 

And this brings us back to my starting point as to reasons for the sorry state of science. Singal identifies the political, the human, factors in play in doing science, especially in the present climate: 

The basic problem here is what Scott Alexander calls “isolated demands for rigor”. This is a standard aspect of human nature, a close sibling of confirmation bias. When it comes to claims we don’t want to believe we will insist the evidence isn’t actually as strong as it appears, demand more and more clarification, shift the goalposts of the debate, and nitpick if necessary; for claims we do want to believe, we’ll wave weak evidence right through the gate without interrogating it too harshly, even if it suffers from exactly the same problems. 

In an outstanding piece of scholarship, Singal goes through the "thought pieces" subsequently run on SBM, pinpointing where statements offered in rebuttal to Shrier's information fail to achieve that goal. Here is the link to the second part of  Singal's effort to bring accuracy and truth to the debate. 

By truth, I refer to Singal's discovery of made-up quotes in one of the pieces that SBM ran after Hall's review was retracted. Though the principals did make some alterations to the pieces SBM ran when notified by Singal, it seems that the professional standing of the principals - one is academic clinical neurologist at the Yale University School of Medicine and the other is professor of surgery and oncology at the Wayne State University School of Medicine (to keep it brief ) - is no safeguard in what should be a clear-cut case of applying science-based medicine to a controversial topic. 

Without defenders from within science, the public is on its own. Bravo! Jesse Singal.

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