Turns out that there is an amazing new technology being tested in surgeries around the world that has been shown to reduce patient deaths in surgery by 50%:
The checklist.
Party like it’s 1867.
Category: Rants
A Taxonomy of Logical Fallacies
Many people on the interwebs would benefit from a study of logical fallacies.
Christianity and Culture
The clueless demagogue Mark Driscoll (but I repeat myself) has recently threatened spouses who fail to adhere to the sacred doctrine of Leave it to Beaver with hellfire and church discipline (which is worse, I wonder?).
John Stackhouse all but calls him an exegetical imbecile.
Ben Witherington brings some much-needed context:
The household Paul has in mind has slaves (see [Titus 2] vss. 9-10) which in itself makes the situation totally different from the modern Western household, unless of course you’ve hired illegal immigrants to do the grunt work at home and are paying them under the table. Then there could be some analogy. But any home that had domestic slaves such as this situation, had the slaves to do ALL THE HOUSEHOLD WORK, including minding the children and helping them with their school lessons. In fact there was a particular household slave used for the latter — the paidagogos which does not mean pedagogue, though that is where the English word comes from, but rather means the child-minder of younger children, the nanny, who among many jobs walked little Publius back and forth to school and helped with the homework.
The wife, in this case, the young wife, did NONE of these jobs on a regular basis, in such a household. She supervised the management of the household. In fact, she was the de facto head of the household. What did the husband do?On a normal day, he handed out the list of jobs to his slaves and clients between 6-9 in the morning, and then he went out to the forum or agora to chew the fat, make business or political contacts, play backgammon, go to the baths and gymnasium, get a hair cut etc. In a situation like this, it was the wife, more than the husband who was not merely the bread baker but the head of the household, making sure their [sic] would be bread on the table. The man’s job was to go out and establish the public reputation of his family through dialogue, meals, going to games. etc. Both husband and wife ‘provided for the family’ in such situations, and in a high status marriage, like those Paul is most concerned about in the Pastorals, very often the women had more money, social status, and business acumen and contacts than the men — which is why a smart man would marry her in the first place. Anyone who has been to Pompeii will have seen the homes in which the front lower level of the house is the family business, for example serving food. On a day to day basis it was more likely to be the wife and slaves who ran the family store front business, while the husband ran around making contacts, playing games, eating with friends and the like.
The problem with fundamentalist nutcases like Mark Driscoll (following in the footsteps of James Dobson et al) is that they are not advocating a return to a Biblical culture, they are advocating a return to a mythical fantasy-land that never existed in any time in history, let alone anywhere in the Bible. The family values displayed in the Bible leave a lot to be desired.
Speaking of Cultural Appropriation
I finally got a hold of The Dazzle of Day by Molly Gloss, a novel about Quakers on a generation starship. It came highly reviewed, and while the writing is evocative, and the characterization deft, I’m finding it hard to keep going, because the Esperanto is all wrong.
Mi finfine trovis The Dazzle of Day (La Blindumo de Taglumo), verkita de Molly Gloss, romano pri kvakeroj vojaÄantaj en generacia stelÅipo. Äœi estis laÅde recenzita, sed malgraÅ ke la skribaĵo bone elvokadas kaj la karakteriÄo spertas, malfacilas al mi daÅre legi, ĉar la Esperantado tute malÄustas.
Despite the note at the beginning about Esperanto pronunciation, it is obvious that the author didn’t bother to actually study any Esperanto beyond the orthography and randomly looking up words in a dictionary. There is not a single Esperanto sentence of any length in the book, which indicates a desire to avoid grammar.
MalgraÅ la komenca noto pri Esperanta prononcado, evidentas ke la verkisto ne penetas studii Esperanton krom la ortografio aÅ hazarde serĉi vortojn en vortaro. Ĉar ne estas sola Esperanta frazo en la libro, la aÅtoro evidente volis eviti gramatikon.
The author is apparently unaware that in Esperanto single words participate in the grammar to a greater degree than in English, or even Spanish: the endings of words are always grammatically significant. She uses nouns ending in “-o”, “-as”, “-a”, “-aÅ”, and “-e”, only the first of which actually marks nouns. The others mark almost without exception1 — the whole point of Esperanto is to be as regular and without exception as possible — respectively a present-tense indicative verb, an adjective, a temporal, spatial or logical particle or conjunction, and an adverb. Even borrowed words take the Esperanto grammatical morphemes.
La verkisto verÅajne ne konas ke en Esperanto solaj vortoj gramatike partoprenas plejmulte ol en la angla aÅ eĉ la hispana: vort-finaĵoj ĉiam gramatike signifas. Åœi uzas substantivajn, kiuj finas kun “-o”, “-as”, “-a”, “-aÅ”, kaj “-e”, de kiuj nur la unua efektive indikas substantivajn. La aliaj indikas preskaÅ sen escepti2 — la interna ideo de Esperanto estas kiel eble plej reguliÄi kaj eviti esceptojn — respektive prezenca verbo, adjectivo, partiklo, kaj adverbo. Eĉ pruntitaj vortoj partoprenas la Esperantan gramatik-sistemon.
The author misuses Esperanto’s word-formation rules, with sometimes baffling and sometimes humourous effect. She uses the word “altejo” to describe a raised section of land, and “loÄio” (borrowed from the Italian “loggia”) for a partly open room. However, in Esperanto, the morpheme “ejo” denotes a particular place used for a particular purpose, and “io” denotes a wide area, usually a country. So the word “altejo” actually means “place for highness”, and “loÄio” means “country of living”. If she had switched the two morphemes they would actually make sense: “altio” means “high country”, and “loÄejo” means “living place”.
La aÅtoro misuzas la Esperantajn reglojn de vort-farado, resulte al aÅ nekomprenebla aÅ humura efekto. Åœi uzas la vorton “altejo” priskribi altigitan landparton, kaj “loÄio” (pruntita de la itala “loggia”) por iom malferma ĉambro. Tamen Esperante la vorteto “ejo” signifas apartan lokon speciale uzatan, kaj “io” signifas larÄan areon, kutime lando. Do la vorton “altejo” aktuale signifas “loko por alteco”, kaj “loÄio” signifas “lando de loÄado”. Se Åi estis ÅanÄanta la duajn vortetojn, ili vere sencus: “altio” signifas “alta lando”, kaj “loÄejo” signifas “loko por loÄi”.
She uses the word “mortafesto” to describe a funeral or wake. This is a strange use of Esperanto grammar (you don’t usually put the adjectival morpheme “-a” in the middle of a word), and would mean “dead feast”, that is, it is the feast itself that is dead. “Mortofesto” is a perfectly reasonable Esperanto construction, and means “death feast”, which is what the author most likely means.
Åœi uzas la vorton “mortafesto” priskribi funebron aÅ funebrofeston. Tiu estas strangan uzadon de Esperanta gramatiko (oni ne kutime metas la adjektiva vorteto “-a” meze en la vorto), kaj signifus evidente “morta festo”, alivorte, estas la festo mem kiu mortas. “Mortofesto” estas tuta prava Esperanta vorto, kaj signifas “festo pri morteco”, kiu estas verÅajne tio, kion la aÅtoro volas diri.
In the introductory note, the author notes that the Esperanto particle “ĉu” marks yes/no questions, and says she will use the English particle “eh?” to achieve the same effect. But in English the word “eh?” most definitely does NOT mark yes/no questions. It asks, do you agree with a statement. So whenever she has a sentence in English postfixed with “eh?”, I try to translate it into Esperanto with a beginning “ĉu”, and suffer a jolt of cognitive dissonance. The proper equivalent to the English “eh?” in Esperanto is a postfixed “ĉu ne?”.
En la enkonduka noto, la verkisto diras, ke la Esperanta partiklo “ĉu” markas demandojn de “jes” aÅ “ne”, kaj Åi promesas, ke Åi uzos la angla partiklo “eh?” por atingi la saman efekton. Sed en la angla la vorton “eh?” definitivege NE markas tiajn demandojn. Äœi demandas, “ĉu vi konsentas, ke ĉi tiu deklaro pravas?” Do kiam ajn Åi skribas anglan frazon kiu finas kun “eh?”, mi provas Äin traduki Esperante kun komenca “ĉu”, kaj sekve mi suferas pafon de “kogna malharmonio”. La prava ekvivalento ol la angla “eh?” estas Esperante finfina “ĉu ne?”.
It makes me sad that an apparently serious and mindful person would so appropriate the heart of another culture — admittedly a small and quirky culture — without bothering to actually learn anything beyond the barest superficity.
Mi malÄojiÄas, ke verÅajne serioza kaj atenta ulo tiel Åtelus la koron de alia kulturo — agnoske eta kaj stranÄa kulturo — sen penete lerni ion ajn krom malplena surfacaĵo.