An existential question for the 21st century: how do you change the duvet cover?
March 30th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
You’d think that duvet covers would have openings on two sides to make it easier to change, but that would be too simple. Instead we have to struggle, but you can find some – not entirely serious – advice here.
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So what is this European Union that the UK is so keen to leave?
March 29th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
On the day that the British Prime Minister Theresa May activates Article 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon to start the process of UK withdrawal from the European Union, you might like to know a little about the formation, structure and operation of the EU. You can find my brief guide here.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
How should you make moral decisions?
March 28th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
There is a runaway trolley barreling down the railway tracks. Ahead, on the tracks, there are five people tied up and unable to move. The trolley is headed straight for them. You are standing some distance off in the train yard, next to a lever. If you pull this lever, the trolley will switch to a different set of tracks. However, you notice that there is one person on the side track. You have two options:
Do nothing, and the trolley kills the five people on the main track.
Pull the lever, diverting the trolley onto the side track where it will kill one person.
What would you do? Which is the most ethical choice?
Suppose there were not five lives at stake if you did nothing but 100 or 1,000 or 10,000? Suppose the one life at stake is somebody you know or like or love? Would these factors change your decision?
The trolley problem thought experiment was first introduced by British philosopher Philippa Foot in 1967. I came across it in the book I am reading at the moment: “The Big Picture: On The Origins Of Life, Meaning And The Universe Itself” by Sean Carroll.
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The Putin paradox: how does a leader so distrusted in the West remain so popular at home?
March 27th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
In this article, Dmitri Trenin – Director of the Carnegie Moscow centre – explains:
“Putin has restored Russia’s status of a great power, lost with the Soviet Union. He first tried to fit Russia into an enlarged west, as a senior ally of the US in Nato and a close partner of the EU within a “greater Europe”. When his efforts failed, he steered Russia away from the western orbit, rebuilt the country’s military power and used it to protect Russian security interests in Ukraine – as he saw them – as well as to project force outside the former empire, to send the message to the world that Russia was back in play. Publicly and resolutely, he stood up to US global dominance.”
How do Russians themselves see this? Trenin argues:
“An autocrat with the consent of the governed, Putin has preserved the essential personal freedoms that the Russian people first earned with the demise of the Communist system. People can worship and travel freely; Facebook and Twitter are essentially unrestricted; there are even a few tolerated media outlets overtly in opposition to the Kremlin. Political freedoms, however, are more tightly circumscribed, so as to leave no chance to potential “colour revolutionaries” or politically ambitious exiled oligarchs. For the bulk of the population, this matters little; the relatively few activists have a choice of taking it – or leaving.”
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Which is Donald Trump’s favourite television programme?
March 27th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
As explained in this article, it is “Fox & Friends”, the three-hour ‘news’ & entertainment programme which goes out each weekend morning on the Fox News Channel. Trump watches it religiously and often tweets in response to what he sees on the programme.
Why does he like the programme so much? Simple. The article suggests that: “In Fox & Friends’ world, Trump is never wrong and everyone always loves Trump. It’s quite a contrast with the liberal world of New York City, where the show is filmed.”
The article suggests of the programme “it may well be the most influential television program in the world”. To use three of Trump’s favourite words, this is sad, bad and mad.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
From Kathmandu to London
March 25th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
I had a very leisurely lunch today (around three hours) in a Moroccan restaurant called “Sidi Maarouf” on Edgware Road in central London..
I was with my young friend Alexei who is ethnically Russian, was brought up in Moldova, and now lives in Germany. He is such a bright and thoughtful man with a couple of degrees, five languages, and lots of international work experience.
The amazing thing is that I have only met Alexei once before when we spent about half an hour talking in a small aircraft at Kathmandu airport in Nepal as we waited to have an aerial view of Mount Everest. In fact, we never even took off because the weather was so bad so neither of us ever saw the mountain [see here].
That was 14 years ago. Thanks to the Internet which has enabled us to keep in contact and a training course run this week in London by his employer Akamai Technologies, we were able to renew our friendship after a decade and a half. Don’t you just love the Net?
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
At last, I again have a main computer that works
March 23rd, 2017 by Roger Darlington
You may have read earlier about my travails with my Mac Mini in this blog posting.
I can now report that, after two visits from techie friends, two long calls to Mac support experts, two visits to an Authorised Service Provider, two hundred pounds in payments and two weeks with no main computer, my Mac is now back and running smoothly.
What was the problem? Well, I bought the Mac Mini five and a half years ago and it came with only 2GB of memory. It seems that the standard today is 8GB and it is not uncommon for some computers even to have 16GB when you buy them new.
So, with only 2GB of memory, my computer really struggled more and more, especially with a recent MacOS Sierra upgrade. So the ASP has put in 8GB and all seems fine. Such a relief …
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So how is President Trump doing so far?
March 22nd, 2017 by Roger Darlington
In the United States, there is a longstanding practice of polling the popularity of the president. There are different polling organisations but one of the most reputable with one of the largest samples is Gallup.
The last Gallup poll of President Barack Obama’s popularity – after a tough eight years in office – found a score 59%. The latest Gallup poll of President Donald Trump’s popularity – in what is traditianlly a honeymoon period for a new office holder – recorded a score of 40%.
Just saying.
You’ll find more detailed data on Obama and Trump and interesting graphs on previous presidents here.
Posted in American current affairs | Comments (0)
A review of the latest Ken Loach film “I, Daniel Blake”
March 21st, 2017 by Roger Darlington
British director Ken Loach – now aged 80 – is a film-maker with singular focus and talent. Nobody else would make a work about the benefits system with such a personal style and powerful impact. Like so many of his films, the acting and dialogue are so naturalistic that the work could almost be a documentary.
Daniel Blake is a carpenter in Newcastle who has suffered the twin blows of bereavement and heart disease. He finds himself caught in the cruel benefits trap whereby his doctor judges him unfit for work but he is denied the Employment & Support Allowance, while the state tells him that he is for enough to work but he has neither the online skills to participate in the jobs market or the physical ability to take on a job.
He meets Londoner Katie, mother of two children, who is in a trap of her own. Her mother and friends are in London but she cannot afford to live there and has relocated to the north-east where the vagaries of the benefits system force her to resort to a food bank and worse. These are two souls who are both financially and materially on the precipice. The unlikely pairing of Daniel and Katie, brilliantly played by Dave Johns and Hayley Squires, is the kind heart of this otherwise searing portrayal of modern-day poverty in one of the richest countries of the world.
Like Daniel, a friend of mine went for a medical assessment (which I attended with him), following which he was refused the Employment & Support Allowance. Like Daniel, my friends appealed against the unfair decision. I spoke at the appeal which he won. Daniel, was not so fortunate. So I know at first hand that this film is a fair, if polemical, representation of what is actually happening and that any of us – in the face of one or two twists of fate – could be in that position.
In the famous movie “Spartacus”, the followers of the eponymous leader of the slave revolt cry out “”I’m Spartacus”. At the conclusion of “”I, Daniel Blake”, I wanted to scream out “I’m Daniel”.
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (1)
Welcome to International Happiness Day
March 20th, 2017 by Roger Darlington
The International Day of Happiness (known as Happiness Day) is celebrated throughout the world on the 20th March. This Happiness Day was founded by United Nations adviser Jayme Illien on 28th June 2012, when all 193 member states of the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted UN resolution 66/281 The International Day of Happiness.
As my contribution to this day, I offer you the following resources on my web site:
- My guide to “How To Be Happy” here
- My review of the book “Happiness” here
- My review of the book “Happiness By Design” here
Enjoy!
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