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#61

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by crazy canuck - Today at 12:53:47 PM

Do you have some evidence for the claim of wide spread infanticide?

I'm not in a position to proclaim whether the argument is correct or not, nor to state what the current scholarly consensus is, but as I understand it's been a fairly mainstream scholarly theory that infanticide was fairly common in pre-Christian Europe at least.

Again, source?  Keep in mind that the Christian writers had a penchant for demonizing non-Christians.

#62

Gaming HQ / Re: Europa Universalis V confi...

Last post by crazy canuck - Today at 12:52:25 PM

My advice is stop thinking about blobbing like you did in the EU I-IV.  You need to think through your expansion carefully and consider all the cultural, religious, economic, political and tactical reasons for expanding or you will end up with a bunch of useless territory. Or worse, territory you cannot hold. 

#63

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by Razgovory - Today at 12:51:28 PM

You've heard of changelings?  A European myth that fairies would steal children and replace them with a fairy.  The fairy would be useless, unable to function as human being.  The solution was to take the changeling and leave it in the forest.  That's how they dealt with the clearly disabled.  They convinced themselves the child was a fairy and left it out in woods to die.  The pre-modern world was rough.

#64

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by Jacob - Today at 12:50:02 PM

Do you have some evidence for the claim of wide spread infanticide?

I'm not in a position to proclaim whether the argument is correct or not, nor to state what the current scholarly consensus is, but as I understand it's been a fairly mainstream scholarly theory that infanticide was fairly common in pre-Christian Europe at least.

#65

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by crazy canuck - Today at 12:49:06 PM

Clergy had children until the 1100s. And even then the rule requiring abstinence was more honoured in the breach.

Also, the rule had nothing to do with population control.

Nuns were often married and had children before entering the nunnery.

Do you have some evidence for the claim of wide spread infanticide?

I mean the Romans were pretty upfront about it.  From the Vindalania letters, we have actually have a soldier telling his wife to kill the child if it's a girl.  I think that a lot of cultures had a major imbalance between men and women mostly favoring men. Infanticide was pretty common among hunter-gatherers and neolithic cultures.   

One letter does not make it common.  And what is your source for hunter gatherers and neolithic cultures practicing it?

#66

Gaming HQ / Re: Dwarf Fortress

Last post by Syt - Today at 12:36:14 PM

  

#67

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Josquius - Today at 12:29:47 PM

Also I think economics is increasingly zero sum both domestically if you're a society with relatively low growth - it is socialism as the language of priorities taken to an extreme. But also I think globally when you're returnin to great power politics, external shocks to supply chains to finance etc. I think an example is Europe suddenly moving into the LNG market after Russia's invasion of Ukraine when we literally paid so much money for gas that tankers that were on their way to their original buyers (particularly Asia, and particularly Pakistan) turning around to come to Europe leading to gas shortages and an even more severe cost of living crisis in some of those parts of the world than Europe. That's an example in Europe but we saw similar in covid, we've seen the US banning tech exports to China, China now restricting exports of processed rare earths. I think we're in more of a zero sum world and where things are made, where they come from, who makes them and who controls them matters more than it did in the past (or, arguably, it always mattered we just stopped caring/paying attention).

I don't agree that this is what a zero sum world means.
A zero sum world is about the idea that someone else being poorer automatically means you become richer. This just isn't true however. A rising tide can lift all boats. Its not automatic, especially not if you want it to be equitable, but we very much can live in a world where becoming richer doesn't mean others becoming poorer.

Gas is an example of this. It shouldn't matter who controls gas as we should shift over to renewables. Oh yes there you've then the issue of the Chinese solar industry vs. others.... but making and selling solar panels is on quite a different scale to keeping the oil flowing.

We shouldn't be afraid of spending money to make money. Austerity clearly hasn't worked. And though yes times are now harder than when it started, that doesn't mean its now the sensible choice.

I also think all democratic politics is ultimately zero sum. I have a set of beliefs and a view of society that is similar to some people's and different to others. If we win, they will lose and vice-versa.

Part of me here says if only it were so.
But more rationally...I don't think this is true.  If my enemies are those who come to power...then I'm just fucked aren't I? We all are. The economy is gone. My family has to leave the country. The country becomes a considerably worse place (despite me not being here, that was a net win obviously).

If 'my side' comes to power.... then that's grand. We've no interest in throwing those who supported the other side into the sea. Rather we want to improve their situation.
Oh sure. They might be upset about all the men holding hands with each other, having to treat black people as equals, and so on... But that's just hurty feelings. Its not the actual negative impact on their lives that they want to force onto others.

#68

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Sheilbh - Today at 12:25:24 PM

Incidentally on the "we think we're richer than we are" point - this has been getting a lot of bullying online (rightly) as a new public art requirement from Cambridge City Council. And while it's a little more complicated than it sounds the threshold is insanely low (10 or more dwellings :blink) and I just don't think we build enough to justify adding in this extra cost:

5. Eligibility
The requirement to meet the public art policy will apply to all developments meeting the following criteria:
Residential developments comprising 10 or more dwellings (or a site area of 0.5 ha or more)
Other developments where the floor space to be built is 1000m2 gross or more (or where the site area is 0.5ha or more), including office, manufacturing, warehousing and retail developments

On smaller developments encouragement will be given to developers to seek to include Public Art within their scheme as a means of enhancing the quality of their development.

6. Cost
The value of public art within the development should be equal to 1% of the construction cost of a capital project. The precise amount will be determined either by the developer providing a detailed written estimate of the building costs or by the application of a nationally recognised building price index.

Expenditure on public art can cover the following:
• Artists fees and fabrication
• Specialist advice and project management
• Linked education programmes

If it is not feasible to spend the allocation on the development site the Council will accept a commuted sum equivalent to 1% of the construction costs via a planning obligation. The use of commuted sums will be considered and allocated by the Council in accordance with the priorities set out in the Public Art Plan of 2002 and updated by the Council from time to time.

In this eventuality the Council will inform the developers of the end use of the sum and will credit the developer appropriately.

Developers may be able to secure external funding to enhance their contribution, for example by applying for grant aid. Details of possible grant sources can be obtained from the Council.

I say that as someone who like art and public art (though quality can vary). Although part of me thinks if you're doing this, that it might even be better spent on landscaping, planting in the area

#69

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Sheilbh - Today at 12:17:44 PM

Not to be mean but could we please prevent ourselves, before it gets too late, to discuss any assumptions that Farage is thinking about anything else but Farage. He is Johnson pushed to the extremes of lazy grifterness. He is bound to be a disaster because governing is more complex than attention-biting snippets of bigotry, he will have no persistence to deal with complex policy and he is surrounded by far-right businessmen and bellends.

I think we need to stop underestimating our opponents and losing.

I also think there is a strange association of moral or political worth with things like being interested in ideas, or being thoughtful, or planning ahead or displaying competence. Which I think is very weird given that many of the worst regimes and ideologies in history had plenty of smart people who were interested in things and intellectually capable, who were thoughtful or competent or thinking ahead. They were doing it in service of bad ideas and beliefs and in some cases I think they were doing evil. But being smart and strategic is no more a guarantee of good politics or morals than enjoying Mendehlson or Shostakovich. And I think states and the tools of state power and the practice of governing is broadly politically neutral. There's exceptions on the extremes (Nazis, Pol Pot) but I think most regime or political types can govern "well" on their own terms.

I should say an awful lot of them are not doing this deeply and are meretricious at best, especially on social media (although perhaps they're more "popularisers") but I think at the current moment, part of the reason the far and radical right in the West have been so successful is precisely because they're interested in ideas - and think they're in a battle of ideas with their opponents. I think a lot of the mainstream parties thought the ideas bit of politics was no longer relevant (the grand narratives had died/been killed) and what mattered was "what works". The scope of their politics narrowed from competing visions of society to technocratic delivery and policy choices because the big issues had been fought and won: liberal democracy, market economics etc. I think we won and engaged in unilateral political disarmament.

I think the consequence of that is that when that order came into a series of significant crises the far and radical right had actually been thinking about alternatives and could make their case as a solution to the crisis (while I think the radical left was basically demoralised and demotivated post-1990 until the crash). While I think that (still) many of the mainstream parties intellectually have "no alternative" (I think in a way Starmer really symbolises this in just thinking that there weren't fundamental problems, it was simply bad management that was the problem). When the conditions changed they've had the intellectual resources and ideas to take advantage in a way that the mainstream parties and the left didn't (I think the left are getting there and the mainstream parties are still browsing airport non-fiction and self-help).

In a way I think that interview was sort of an example of that - in other respects it wasn't good for Farage who was patronising. But the Bloomberg reporter saying (at the end of the interview on lighter stuff) she'd heard that he reads a lot and asking what he was reading at the minute. He then said Mr Balfour's Poodle which was written by Roy Jenkins (one of my favourite politicians), I think in the 60s, about the clash between the Liberal majority in the Commons wanting to pass Lloyd-George's "People's Budget" for which they had a democratic mandate, being blocked by the Tory Lords (or as Lloyd-George called them "Mr Balfour's Poodle") which resulted in the Parliament Acts and the principle that the unelected Lords cannot block legislation from the democratically elected Commons if it was in the government's manifesto. A deliberately suggestive choice that Farage is thinking about what winning might look like (I'm not sure it'd help him). I think the interviewer's slightly incredulous response was telling of the same point: "[from] the early twentieth century? Why were you interested in that? You're going back a hundred years to try and find the answers?" (As someone who occasionally enjoys history from before 1911 also felt a little attacked by that Separately also think this goes to the problems in higher education and public broadcasting of "relevance" and presentism.)

Also just as an aside I think Farage and Johnson are very, very different. The first party Farage voted for was the Greens because they were the only party committed to leaving the EEC (as it then was). He's then spent his entire political life basically taking over or setting up new parties on the fringes of politics. There have been many, many right-wing Tories who basically thought he was one of them and have tried to get him to just defect and become a Tory. His entire political project is to destroy and supplant the Tory party. I think that's an entirely different mindset and trajectory than someone like Johnson (or Cameron for that matter) who envisioned and rose in politics by attaching their career to the Tory party, which is historically one of the most electorally successful political parties in the free world and a "natural party of government".

Well if a primary concern about the UK is not being rich, I would not turn to Nigel Farago, whose principal claim to fame is the policy that knocked about 5+% off of the country's trend GDP.

I think my argument is actually that a lot of the problems (from a policy perspective) in Britain is because we're not rich and we're not growing, but that a lot of our political dysfunctions comes from a (mistaken) complacency that we basically are. To an extent I think Farage's success is part of that.

Although I think this is a bit like Trump in that we're slightly in the "fuck around and don't find out" world. With Brexit the impact was broadly as you say and in line with Bank of England projections. It was not the what George Osborne in the Treasury and the Remain campaign were saying would happen. They said there'd be a recession, hundreds of thousands of jobs lost, house prices collapsing b up to 20% etc - which didn't happen. Similarly Trump's tariffs are bad but so far the impact is less than I'd anticipated or the worst predictions of the impact and, so far (according to Goldman Sachs), US companies are eating over 50% of the cost (I suspect this varies by market/susceptibility to political pressure). In both I think catastrophe didn't follow, the markets didn't act as avenging furies - they adapted, perhaps more robustly than anticipated. Despite all of that, for example, the UK still has an economy that's growing faster than the Eurozone or most other big European countries - which I think should be embarassing for everyone.

But I think it's why we need to go back to making the argument for the thing we want and against what we don't because there is no external punishing force for violations of liberal norms and politics isn't a morality play where the bad are punished and the virtuous rewarded. Or to the extent there is (as I think these are often bad policies/ideas) the impact is too slow motion and gradual for politics to just sort of thermostatically respond.

For many of his supporters they've given up on their own situation becoming any better. If they can just make other people's situation worse though then its worth it.
Zero sum economics plays a part. But also just crabs in bucket spite.

Also, to Duncan Weldon's point, and not just the UK (maybe more for the population decline thread) but I don't know what democratic politics looks like with an ageing population who are effectively post-economic. They often have fixed steady incomes but don't really care abou growth or unemployment - what matters are asset prices (particularly of homes, their biggest asset) and low inflation. They prioritise short-term spending on immediate needs like pensions, healthcare, social care over longer term spending like education, childcare, infrastructure. And they turn out more than any other group. I can't help but look at Europe in general and think there is something of the politics of the retirement home about it. Just leave us alone with our pensions and our holidays and our recyclying our way to net zero while the rest of the world is engaged in transformative projects of muscular state capitalism.

Again it's why, for all of his flaws and failures, I still sort of admire Macron for trying to break Europe out of that.

Also I think economics is increasingly zero sum both domestically if you're a society with relatively low growth - it is socialism as the language of priorities taken to an extreme. But also I think globally when you're returnin to great power politics, external shocks to supply chains to finance etc. I think an example is Europe suddenly moving into the LNG market after Russia's invasion of Ukraine when we literally paid so much money for gas that tankers that were on their way to their original buyers (particularly Asia, and particularly Pakistan) turning around to come to Europe leading to gas shortages and an even more severe cost of living crisis in some of those parts of the world than Europe. That's an example in Europe but we saw similar in covid, we've seen the US banning tech exports to China, China now restricting exports of processed rare earths. I think we're in more of a zero sum world and where things are made, where they come from, who makes them and who controls them matters more than it did in the past (or, arguably, it always mattered we just stopped caring/paying attention).

I also think all democratic politics is ultimately zero sum. I have a set of beliefs and a view of society that is similar to some people's and different to others. If we win, they will lose and vice-versa.

#70

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by Josquius - Today at 12:16:43 PM

If we are talking medieval Europe I'm not aware of infanticide being very common.

I guess it depends on what you mean by common.

Leaving children to die via exposure was much more common. It was a commonly observed phenomenon and lots of fiction is based on stories about it. That might as well be infanticide.

I got the impression a lot of that was just because it was seen as absolutely horrific. Not because it was common.
See how they'd rush to baptise newborns ASAP just in case, the burying of babies right up against church foundations so they could get the maximum of holy-water poured on them, etc...
Possibly later on there could have been aspects of knowledge about the Greeks coming through, they were a lot more into killing babies.

It is a wonder though how they'd have dealt with the clearly disabled. Thats not something i've heard too much about.