This clip of Jorge Luis Borges is doing the rounds again and I think he has a point. Being Argentinian, he was obviously fluent in Spanish and here he expresses why he feels that English is a finer language:
[…] English is both a Germanic and a Latin language. Those two registers – for any idea you take, you have two words. Those words will not mean exactly the same. For example if I say “regal” that is not exactly the same thing as saying “kingly.” Or if I say “fraternal” that is not the same as saying “brotherly.” Or “dark” and “obscure.” Those words are different. It would make all the difference – speaking for example – the Holy Spirit, it would make all the difference in the world in a poem if I wrote about the Holy Spirit or I wrote the Holy Ghost, since “ghost” is a fine, dark Saxon word, but “spirit” is a light Latin word.
While Danish gets a great many words from other languages I think it, too, lacks the finer resolution that Borges admires here.
This is not the same as audience capture where a self-reinforcing feedback loop rewards you for telling your audience what they want to hear. It is focusing on the audience that is actually invested in your product, rather than in exercising their power over you.
I saw this mentioned as ongoing research and assumed it would take decades to materialise. Instead it is now, very soon, a commercial product: A paste that will permanently protect your teeth from cavities.
The idea is to introduce a gene-modified Streptococcus mutans strain to your teeth. The existing S. mutans produce lactic acid, which is the main cause of dental cavities, while the modified strain doesn’t. The modified strain still releases Mutacin 1140, which S. mutans uses to limit the growth of similar bacteria. The modified S. mutans should then slowly kill off the “natural” strains and replace them in your mouth, without the ability to produce lactic acid.
It should be a one-time application, unless you need to take a broad-spectrum antibiotic that is targeted your oral biome. And that is rare.
You still need to brush your teeth twice a day though.
If this is actually true, and I tend towards believing it, this could be the first time since the dawn of agriculture that humans wouldn’t have to worry about dental cavities.
Our estimates for the timing of the demographic expansion in S. mutans coincide with the origin of human agriculture [10,000 years ago]…. Numerous studies in physical anthropology have shown an increased prevalence of dental caries in human remains from post-agricultural societies (5–50%) when compared with remains of Mesolithic hunter–gatherers (0–2%). This pattern has been attributed to changes in diet and the consequent increase in consumption of carbohydrates in human populations after the development of starchy crops, leading to the establishment of infectious agents causing dental caries. Our timing and expansion estimates are consistent with S. mutans as a possible etiological agent of human dental caries; however, it is not possible to rule out other oral bacteria species as also contributing to the development of this disease.
— “Evolutionary and Population Genomics of the Cavity Causing Bacteria Streptococcus mutans”
BCS3-L1 will soon be home-delivered in the U.S. for the price of a single dental filling, and there are plans to expand to other locations in the works too. The scourge of poor dental health that has wracked humanity for 10,000 years might soon be behind us.
A lucky part of all of this is that we’ll only need to try our hand at eradication once.
Like smallpox, S. mutans doesn’t have some natural reservoir that will crop up to re-infect humans with a wild strain that brings caries back. After we’ve gotten rid of it, it’s likely that caries will simply be diminished to the point of irrelevance for the vast majority of mankind. What’s more, because of the parent-to-child transmission described at this article’s outset, if a would-be parent is colonized, their kids will end up living a life that’s likely to include far fewer or zero caries.
The benefits for the poor, the old, infirm, and incapable of taking care of themselves, and the Third World are so large that there ought to be a public health initiative to spread this around. Such an effort would ultimately save many billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands, millions, or—in the long-enough run—potentially billions of human lives.
— Cremieux, “The Rise and Impending Fall of the Dental Cavity“
In a couple of days a small part of the Earth will experience a total solar eclipse. You might be able to spot where in USA it will happen if you look at this map of AirBNB’s that are fully booked:
This is contrary to popular opinion and in contrast to “fire weather” being more probable (“in southern Europe, northern Eurasia, the US, and Australia“) due to climate change. I expect the fall in wildfire are burned is due to humans actively removing the wildfire fuel to prevent them. The increased reporting on wildfires is likely due to it both fitting the “climate catastrophe” narrative and humans increasingly developing property in proximity to places where wildfires are possible.
The Scottish Enlightenment will die on April 1st 2024, exactly 327 years, eight months and 24 days after the incident that provoked it. For on April 1st the Hate Crime and Public Order Act (Scotland) 2021 comes into force, an Act which will criminalise speech and opinion deemed ‘hateful’ even if spoken in the privacy of your own home.
— C.J. Strachan, “R.I.P. The Scottish Enlightenment 1697-2024“
As many probably know by now, the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021 came into force on April 1st. The law was hailed by the Scottish government as a way to combat hate crime but as it includes “hate speech”, even speech in private, many saw it rightly as an authoritarian attack on free speech.
Tom Walker’s Jonathan Pie character explains it thus:
Apart from the places Walker mentions in his piece above – which were interesting in themselves – the Scottish police have an online form that you can use to anonymously report anyone for anything. Yes, no-one at all would ever misuse that and waste valuable police time.
From August 1 you will be able to get damages from a university in England if it doesn’t allow you to express a view that from April 1 will get you arrested in Scotland.
— James Orr
In the days up to April 1st a lot of men were getting ready to finally have a tool to get feminists in Scotland to shut up. Instead, what they got was J.K. Rowling calling the bluff of her government.
One of the imagined “crimes” of the new Scotland was of course stating simple truths, such as that men are men no matter how they dress, what surgeries they may or may not have had, and how they identify. This has become the focus of feminist struggles in recent years for if you can’t define what a woman is, you can’t protect women. Rowling published a thread on Twitter/X where she did just that: Stated that men are men.
For 10 years the LGBTQ+ movement insisted on ‘No Debate’ about its mad trans agenda. The Hate Crime Act was supposed to enforce that silence. It’s backfired. Today @jk_rowlinglaunched the debate we should have had.
— Malcolm Clark
J.K Rowling: That’s a man.
Police Scotland: If you say that after the 1st we will arrest you.
TRAS: When the law comes in we are gonna call the police & have you arrested for hate speech you old bigot witch.
J.K Rowling on the 1st: These are men.
TRA: Quick everyone report her.
Police: Hmm well this is embarrassing isn’t it, seems like our law is unworkable so we won’t be arresting J.K Rowling.
TRA: See that you stupid woman, the police were never gonna arrest you anyway so way make a big deal of it.
— Aja the Empress
It’s hard to overstate how important – and strategically brilliant – @jk_rowling’s power move was today, a first-move checkmate that effectively neutered Scotland’s dangerous new #HateCrimeBill. By openly and unambiguously breaking this law – on a massive public platform – on its very first day, she has in effect nullified the law by forcing the authorities in Scotland into a corner where they only have two options, both of which will be this laws downfall
[…]
Option 1) Enforce the law as it’s written, arrest Ms Rowling, creating the world’s greatest Streisand Effect and put this law under the kind of extreme scrutiny it was never designed to withstand.
[…]
Option 2) They DONT enforce the law (precisely BECAUSE they know it would kick off a humiliating battle they cannot win, and would galvanize such strong public support against the law that the SNP would likely suffer catastrophic political consequences) and the Elephant In The Room of having such a massive public personality so openly break the law without any consequences effectively renders the law null and void for anybody charged with it who ISN’T JK Rowling. All anybody charged with this law would have to do would be introduce Rowling’s tweet thread in court and make the extremely persuasive argument that it is being selectively and arbitrarily enforced. After all, if such a massive public voice isn’t charged under this law, clearly the law is unenforceable on anyone else. In effect, Rowling has created a shield for anyone WITHOUT her massive platform and deep pockets with her thread that – so long as it remains public on @X and she remains uncharged – effectively gives anyone else a Get Out of Jail Free card.
— The Heretical Liberal
The next day the Scottish police gave up and declared that Rowling’s tweets were not criminal and Rowling made the point explicit:
I hope every woman in Scotland who wishes to speak up for the reality and importance of biological sex will be reassured by this announcement, and I trust that all women – irrespective of profile or financial means – will be treated equally under the law.
— J.K. Rowling
—
Despite the partial win for free speech in Scotland, the law still stands and might be used to censor speech. Similar laws are proposed in Ireland and Canada. The Canadian law has the added incentive of cash awarded to those that report other people for imagined hate speech, and opens the possibility of putting people in jail for a “hate crime” that hasn’t even been committed yet but is suspected to be. The Irish law would criminalise possession of memes. Not unlike a current Danish criminal case which currently stands as an example of restriction of free speech.
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