I went to the zoo to see the baguettes…
….They’re bread in captivity.
The had a pig there, sweltering in the sun.
He was bakin’
I dan’t go the symphony anymore, these days …
… It’s all sax and violins.
Robert Buxbaum, Aug. 2, 2023 –It’s summer, what do you expect? Life’s a beach.
A catalyst walks into a bar. The bartender says, “We can’t serve you.”
The catalyst asks, “Why not?”
The bartender says, “The last time you were here, you started something.”
Robert Buxbaum, July 14, 2023 (Bastille day). If you like this, maybe you’d like another, chemistry joke or this physics joke.
Jewish education is a mess according to the Times. Most anyone outside it, who’d look in would agree: Ancient books, pre-science outlooks, anti-inclusive, and taught in a garble of languages, Yiddish, English, Aramaic, Hebrew. The New York Times has runs regular editorials claiming that Jewish education robs children of a future, or an entrance to society, producing adults who know nothing of geometry or higher math, or modern history, incapable of voting intelligently in today’s elections (they often vote Republican). The Times’s experts, are often the products of this education, but claim to have risen above it, only because of extra work. As a proof, they often cite the Talmud as a source of useless knowledge of ancient Jewish law, rejected Bible history, and only the most basic views of math. By way of a response, I’d like to quote something I’d heard in synagog a couple of weeks back:
“I’m so glad that I learned geometry in school, and not taxes. It’s really come in handy this parallelogram season.“
The speaker was an accountant, and the point of the joke is that there is no parallelogram season. There is a tax season, though, and tax law follows a bizarre logic that is not geometric, but is somewhat talmudic. As for the useless languages, they are all in use, both as spoken languages and written languages, no less useful than Latin, and certainly more alive. There are currently 5 yiddish-language newspapers being published in New York alone, see below. They compete with each other for readers, while competing also with the Times, the Post, and with another ten or more Hebrew and English journals, several of them Jewish, either published on paper or as web-journals. People read them, though the Times prefers to ignore their existence.
And that brings us to the subject matter, Talmud. Much of Jewish learning is Talmud, either distilled or pure, study of a set of books written between 1000 and 2000 years ago in Israel, Babylon, and France mostly, with commentaries from Spain, Morocco, Egypt, Germany, and Poland. Those who learned talmud tend to find it useful. The legal organization and approach resonates to them in the understanding of taxes, contracts, building, damage assessment, marriage, ethics, even in dealing with alcoholism. Talmud is so useful that it’s common for working, orthodox Jews to continue their learning it throughout their lives. A common practice is to learn a page every day in synchrony with other Jews. Today’s page, when I started writing this post, was Nazir 10. It includes a talking cow, just the sort of section that the Times likes to cite to show the uselessness of it all. I’ll forgive their lack of understanding, but not their laziness for not even bothering to try to understand.
Nazir 10 begins by saying: “If a cow says, ‘I will be a Nazir (that is, I will give up wine for a month) if I stand up’. Then, if it gets up, one school of rabbinic thought (Bais Shammai) says he is a nazir. Another school of thought (Bais Hillel) says he is not a nazir.” The page goes on to speak about taking doors, but I’ll stop here after the first 2 sentences and will try to explain what the Times does not care to examine.
Notice that cows are female, and they typically don’t speak, but here you find a “he” who might have to give up wine. This “he”, this male, is understood to be a person looking at the cow, likely a person with an alcohol problem. He sees a cow lying on the ground (in the mud figuratively) and identifies it to himself. That is, he sees himself lying in the mud. He thinks it’s impossible for the cow to get up because he imagines that he himself can not get up. (This is just the Talmud’s way of discussing things). According to Bais Shammai, the person is understood to have said to himself, “if that cow can get up, I will take it as a sign that I can get up, and I will take it on myself to avoid wine and wine products for a month.” Now, according to Bais Shammai, if the cow gets up, the man is obligated to stop drinking for a month.
Bais Hillel says he is not obligated at all. They say that a drunk who wants to change, must do more than be inspired, he must make a real verbal commitment. He must verbally obligate himself to give up drink. We follow this latter opinion, but learn Bais Shammai’s view too, because there are important ideas about self-identity.
Those are just the first two lines of the page. In secular school, you learn stories too, sometimes stories with talking animals, but these are usually modern stories, where the challenges are external, bullying say, but in a sense such stories are sanitized. The internal demons are removed, and these are often the hardest to battle. Even dealing with external problems is often pushed on an external authority, a teacher usually. You are considered to be too weak to deal with a problem. Sometimes that’s true, usually there is at least some part you could deal with. The lack of self-obligation leaves modern school stories flat. Few kids enjoy them, or feel they get anything from them. A result in Detroit is that schools have <50% attendance. Kids leave barely literate with appalling math skills. We blame the teachers and the subject. It’s the book: Sally has 15 tomatoes and wants to give 4 to a friend, how many will she have left? is this relevant? Does this excite?
Talmud teaches some logic, some math, and some geometry, but only for measuring distances and volumes, the application that geometry was named for (geometry = measuring the earth). They learn the rest as needed, and often learn quite a lot.
The products of Jewish education become successful, often in business, hiring their better-educated brothers. Some become lawyers, accountants, writers, businessmen, or psychologists — more than our share in the population — or mathematicians and scientists. Some even excel in academics or journalism. The Times does not mention this.
My three children all went to Jewish, religious school and got the education that the Times calls abuse. So far, my son (31) has two masters degrees, both in artificial intelligence/ computer science. My older daughter (28) is getting her PhD in Psychology, and my younger daughter (23) is working on her masters in epidemiology. I suspect they benefited from the education. My suggestion to the Times, is in another Marx quote: “If you find it hard to laugh at yourself, I would be happy to do it for you.”
Robert Buxbaum, March 1, 2023. “History may not think with its feet, but it certainly doesn’t walk on its head.”– Karl Marx, the less-funny, Marx brother. Jewish educated, he became a journalist.
Doctor Anthony Fauci has been giving graduate addresses at colleges around the country for the past few months, telling students about his struggles and successes in the medical research world, hammering a moral point that they should expect the unexpected and have no tolerance for “the normalization of untruth”, and for “egregious twisting and lies” as were leveled against his approach to COVID (and global warming, it seems). Untruths, racism, and lies spread by “some elected officials”, presumably his exboss. Here is his speech to the Princeton graduates, or see a brief summary of his talk st the University of Michigan.
Dr. Fauci may have the best intentions in criticizing others and deputizing students to enforce the truth.He certainly seems sure that his truth and intentions are 100% pure, but what if Fauci wasn’t quite right, or what if you thought his cure to the pandemic was less than marvelous. His truth may mot be real truth, or real truth for everyone. Beyond that, even if he were always 100% right on science, I believe that people have a fundamental right to make mistakes. “I have a right to be wrong,” as Joss Stone says (see music video). Freedom from imposed righteousness is a fundamental good. Even assuming that Fauci’s lockdowns were the height of righteousness, we have a right to take risks and to act against our own best interests, in my opinion. Consider a saint who really knows what’s right and only wants to do only what’s right. I doubt that even the saint wants a jailer to force it upon him and remove his free will. And the right of the rest of us may not want to do what’s ideal and healthy. We like ice cream even thought we know it’s fattening, and we should have the right to smoke too.
This right to our mistakes is something we deserve, even assuming that Fauci knows the truth for everyone, and that everyone has the same truth, and that all of his rules were for the best. But different people are different, and people’s preferences are different. “A sadist is a masochist who follows the golden rule,” as the saying goes, and Fauci may have been out-and-out wrong.
Concerning COVID, I’ve noted that, despite Fauci’s lockdowns and mask mandates, The US did worse than Sweden, and my home state of Michigan did worse than Sweden — worse in terms of deaths, and far worse economically. Michigan has the same size population as Sweden and the same climate and population density so it’s a good comparison. Florida did better than we did too, though they too didn’t close the schools or have mask mandates. Their economy did better too, and children’s education.
Was Fauci right to shut K-12 schools, or to send college students home? Maybe he was only half-right, or totally wrong and blinded by politics. The more Fauci and friends deny having political interests, the more they seem political. Many Fauci’s emails have become public, and he seems highly political, and very often wrong. He also does not take seriously the economic or mental or educational problems caused to the workers that he now blames on his critics. He also seems takes it as a given that those pushing hydroxychloroquine or surface disinfection were liars, despite scientific opinion on the other side.
Fauci’s push for masks went with his claim that surfaces were not major spreaders. I think the opposite is true, and used my blog and YouTube to push iodine as a surface sanitizer and hand wash. Most diseases are spread by surfaces, and I see no reason for COVID to be different. Iodine is known to kill COVID virus, and all virus, fungus, and bacteria. It’s far more lang-lasting than alcohol, too. Maybe I’m wrong, but maybe I’m right, and I have a right to express my science without fear of censure from Fauci’s deputies. As I see it, when an infected person coughs out-spews big droplets and small droplets. The big drops contain far more virus particles. They fall quickly and dry, ready to be picked up by someone who touches the residue. As for the smaller drops, some are certainly locked by masks, but these have fewer virus particles. Besides, the mask just becomes a new surface; you’ll touch your mask to adjust it or take it off. Unless you disinfect your hands with something strong like iodine the virus on your hands will go to your eyes or nose. Trump favored Chlorox for surfaces, and was skewered for it by Fauci and his experts. I think that was wrong, made worse by claims that he was not telling you to inject the Clorox.
On climate too, we do students a disservice by closing the discussion. It’s clear that Gore’s inconvenient truth isn’t completely true, nor are his remedies beneficial, in my opinion. To stop someone’s ability to make mistakes is to wrong him, and limit him. The same applies to many things; the fellow in power always thinks he’s right, and will always have allies to back him. When Robespierre was the enforced virtue and truth during the French Revolution, everyone agreed, but we now think he was wrong. Robespierre removed the head of France’s greatest scientist, Lavoisier. It would take another generation to grow another head like that.
In terms of interesting speeches to the graduates, As Marx said (Groucho), “I thought my razor was dull, till I heard his speech.” There here’s a speech against something.
Robert Buxbaum, October 28, 2022
Monty Python’s “Life of Brian” presents the fictional story of Brian, someone born in the stable next door on Christmas Day, who is repeatedly mistaken for the messiah by a crowd that never gets the message right. We follow Brain as he grows and preaches wisdom, like “Think for yourselves, work it out, you’re all individuals.” The crowd then answers, in unison, “Yes! We’re all individuals.” Eventually Brian joins the People’s Liberation Front of Judea and is crucified by the Romans. Brian’s thoughts aren’t bad, but the humor is how completely his followers mess them up. Another example, near the end of the film, happens with Brian on the cross. A band of fanatical followers comes to the rescue, his “suicide squad”. They proceed to commit suicide, See it here. Brian can only say, “You silly sots.” It’s comedy. It’s a funny/sad take on religious martyrs, and it provoked a united condemnation by the three great religions because the comedy is relevant, and thus dangerous.
The movie opened in the Us, and was called “blasphemous” by the Catholic Church, and “a crime against religion.” The Catholic film-monitoring office rated it “C” for Condemned. Among Jewish leaders, Rabbi Abraham Hecht of Chabad/Lubovich asked to have the movie banned as a danger to civic peace. Chabad/Lubovich was promoting their own leader as the messiah (he had not proclaimed himself) so the film must have touched a particularly sensitive nerve.
Rabbi Hecht claimed, in The New York Times, Aug 28, 1979, “This film is so grievously insulting that we are genuinely concerned that its continued showing could result in serious violence.” He was joined by the Union of Orthodox Rabbis and the Rabbinical Council of Syrian and Near Eastern Sephardic Communities of America, asking to have the movie banned. They had not asked to have any other movies banned before or since.
The US protestant opposition was headed by Robert Lee of the Lutheran council, who called it “a profane parody” in a broadcast carried by 1,000 radio stations. The religions united to buy a 1 page protest in “Variety,” a rare show of unity. The movie was banned in Italy, Ireland, Chile, Norway, parts of Britain (as a health danger), and likely many other countries. Ireland waited 8 years for a showing; Italy waited twenty years; Aberystwyth, Wales waited thirty years. The ban hasn’t yet been lifted in any of these places, by the way, nor have the religious bans been lifted. It seems that all religions agree you should not think for yourself abut God, or imagine that the leaders might have got things wrong.
In Britain, the effort to ban the movie were spearheaded by the “Festival of Lights,” a Protestant group. A leader of that group, Malcolm Muggeridge, debated two of the Pythons on TV, joined by Mervyn Stockwood, bishop of Southwark. See the full Life of Brian 1979 Debate, here. Malcolm Muggeridge had been editor of Punch, Britain’s top humor magazine. He argued that the movie was unfunny. Bishop Stockwood was considered a liberal, known to favor homosexual marriage within the church. He would not tolerate religious deviance, though and argued that the movie was sacrilegious, especially the song at the end. Neither individual seems to listen to anything the Pythons say. Stockwood ended the debate by saying that the Pythons “would get their 20 pieces of silver, that’s for sure”.
Despite being banned in many countries and by all major religions, the movie was financial success, in part because of the controversy. Its enemies too, in part for their controversy. The Festival of Lights gained notoriety for the protests of sex and violence in the movies. The Catholic Church banned more movies: Shaft, Rambo, Friday the 13th, and all the Borat movies. Rabbi Hecht protested the Israeli rabbinate for making conversion too easy, then pushed the idea that gentiles have to live by a Lubovich interpretation of “The Laws of Noach.” And finally, in June 1995, Hecht pressed for the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres: “Such people should be killed before they can perform the deed.” [the Oslo accords]. Rabin was assassinated five months later — after the accords were signed. Hecht was presented with a 6 month leave from his pulpit. There were no general condemnations of the banners within their sects, though. All seem to agree that religion is about loving your neighbor, and banning or assassinating those who are not loving enough.
The most contentious part of the movie is the song at the end. It has become popular at funerals and with the terminally ill: “Always look on the bright side of life.” It’s comforting without being preachy: “When you’re chewing on life’s gristle, don’t grumble, give a whistle, and this will help things turn out for the best. And always look on the bright side of life….” Bishop Stockton found this song the most offensive part, and my sense of why is that, as a bishop, he feels he must be seen to stand between you and God. No one like that wants a terminally ill person to look at him and “give a whistle.”
Robert Buxbaum, September 2, 2022. I’ve previous written about the use of miracles in religion, and that total loyalty does not serve the follower, and doesn’t even help the leader.
Most of science is induction. Scientists measure correlation, for example that fat people don’t run as much as thin people. They then use logic to differentiate cause from effect that is do they not run because they are fat, or are they fat because they don’t run, or is everything base on some third factor, like genetics. At every step this is all inductive logic, but that’s how science is done.
The lack of certainty shows up especially commonly in health work. Many of our cancer cures are found to not work when studied under slightly different conditions. Similarly with weight los, or heart health. I’d mentioned previously that CPAPs reduce heart fibrillation, and heart filtration is correlated with shortened life, but then we find that CPAP use does not lengthen life, but seems to shorten it. (see a reason here). That’s the problem with induction; correlation isn’t typically predictive in a useful way.
Despite these problems, this is how science works. You look for patterns, use induction, find an explanation, and try to check your results. I have an essay on the scientific methods, with quotes from Sherlock Holmes. His mysteries are a wonderful guide, and his inductive leaps are almost always true. Meanwhile, the inductive leaps of Watson and Lastrade are almost always false.
Robert Buxbaum, May 9, 2022
I’m writing a book about reverse psychology; please don’t buy it.
The judge said I had to keep 6 feet away from my ex-wife. So I buried her under the patio.
Robert Buxbaum: the above 3 jokes are from Jack Rappaport — He sometimes sells jokes. April 13, 2022. The ones below are from Gahan Wilson, and the one at right, I don’t know.
These last two are from Gahan Wilson
Large chunks of Michigan shut down for the prime days of hunting season, from the middle of October to early November. About 8% of the state gets a hunting license each year, some 800,000 people, all trying to “Bag a buck.” Michigan is an open carry state for rifles and holstered pistols, something seen recently in the state capitol, I’d say this was an illegal example since there is also a brandishing law, but it gives a sense of things here. About 29% of the state owns at least one gun, and usually more. There are about as many guns as people. Getting bullets, on the other hand, is near impossible, both for handguns and for most rifles, shotguns excluded.
A lot of the attraction of hunting is that you get to eat what you kill. Mot people do this or donate it to a food back. Hunting is also cheaper than golf. Rural farmers also hunt to protect their crops from crows, squirrels, rabbits, rats, snakes, and raccoons. This is legitimate hunting, in my opinion, even though you typically don’t eat crow. Some people do hunt bear, but that’s a different story (I like to be dressed). It’s possible that the bullet shortage is just a hiccup in the supply chain, “supply and demand” but it’s been going on for 12 years now so I suspect it’s here to stay.
Michigan, was once a Republican, pro-gun stronghold. It has swung Democrat and anti-gun for the last few years. Bulletes have been scare for about that long, at least since the Obama election or the Sandy Hook shooting. Behind this is a general trend of urbanization and class-action law suits. At this point, few sporting stores carry guns or bullets, and those that do, tend to hide them in a back room. Amazon carries neither bullets nor guns, and the same holds at e-bay, Craig’s list, and Walmart on line. Dunhams still sells guns but the only bullets, when I visited today were, 17 caliber, 227 and duck-hunting, shotgun shells. Gone were normal handgun calibers: 22, 25, 32, 38, 45, 357, and 9mm. The press seems OK with duck or moose hunting; not so OK with anything else.
The salesman at Dunham’s said that he had moved to bow hunting, something that’s becoming common, but it’s incredibly difficult even with modern bows. I can rarely hit a non-moving target at 50 feet on the first arrow, and I can only imagine the frustration of trying to hit a moving target after sitting in a cold blind for days waiting for one to appear whose distance and placement is unknown, and that might disappear at any moment, or attack me then disappear.
Part of the problem is that arrows travel at only about 250 ft/s, or about 1/6 the speed of a bullet. Thus, an arrow fired from 50 yards takes about 0.6 seconds to hit. In that time it drops about 6 feet and must be aimed 6 feet above the deer if you hope to hit it. A riffle bullet falls only about 2 inches, about 1/36 as much. Whaat’s more, though an arrow is about three times heavier than a hunting bullet, its slow speed means it hits with only about 1/10 the kinetic energy, about the same as hunting with a 22 from a handgun.
There are those who say the bullet shortage will go away on its own because of supply and demand. That’s true until the government steps in in the name of public safety. Though recreational marijuana and moonshine are both legal, government regulation means that prices are high and supply is limited, with a grey market of people buying high and selling higher. I’m seeing the same with ammunition; there is tight supply, a grey market, and a fair number of people trying to reload spent ammunition using match-tips for primers. Talk about white lightning.
R. E. Buxbaum, December 24, 2020.
Enjoy dinner with your family and friends, even if it’s awkward. It’s the awkwardness of your friends that makes you love them. No one really loves perfection. And enjoy your dinner. No one really likes a prig, not even God.
My cousin and his wife are coming to dinner. They’re both Bugs Bunny fans. He proposed via a WhatsApp.doc
In terms of the holiday ham; Jesus was Jewish. No ham. When doing with the disciples, he probably ordered falafel and 13 glasses of water.
Robert Buxbaum, November 2, 2020
I’m not crazy about the COVID isolation, but there are up-sides that I’ve come to appreciate. You might too. Out of boredom, I was finally got into meditation. It was better than just sitting around and doing nothing.
It’s best not to look at isolation as a problem, but an opportunity. I’ve developed a serious drinking opportunity.
And it’s an opportunity to talk to myself. I told myself I’ should quit drinking. Then I figured, why should I listen to a drunk who talks to himself.
A friend of mine was on drugs, but then quit. Everyone in his house is happy, except for the lamp. The lamp won’t talk to him anymore.
The movies are closed, and the bars, and the gyms. It gives me another reason not to go to the gym.
Did you know that, before the crowbar was invented, crows used to drink at home.
The real reason dogs aren’t allowed in bars: lots of guys can’t handle their licker.
I like that I don’t commute. Family events are over zoom, funerals (lots of funerals), meetings, lectures. They come in via the computer, and I don’t have to dress or attend. No jacket, no pants… no travel …. no job.
My children are spending more time with us at home. We have virtual meals together. I discovered that I have a son named Tok. He seems to like my dad-jokes.
My wife is finding it particularly tough. Most every day I see her standing by the window, staring, wondering. One of these days, I’ll let her in.
I asked wife why she married me. Was it for my looks, or my income, or my smarts. She smiled and said it was my sense of humor. 🙂
My wife is an elementary school teacher. She teaches these days with a smart board. If the board were any smarter, it would go work for someone else. It’s necessary, I guess. If you can’t beat them, you might as well let the smart board teach. I think the smart board stole the election. It began by auto-correcting my spelling. Then it moved to auto correct my voting. The board is smarter and better than me (Hey, who wrote this?)
You’d think they’d reduce the number of administrators in the schools, given that it’s all remote. Or reduce the price of college. It would be nice if they’d up the number of folks who can attend. So far no. Today the Princeton alumni of Michigan is sponsoring video-talk by Princeton alumnus, George Will. I wanted to attend, but found there was limited seating, so I’m on the waiting list (true story). By keeping people out, they show they are exclusive. Tuition is $40,000 / year, and they keep telling us that the college is in service of humanity. If they were in the service of humanity, they’d charge less, and stream the talk to whoever wants to listen in. I have to hope this will change sooner or later.
Shopping for toilet paper was a big issue at the beginning of the pandemic, but I’ve now got a dog to do it for me. He goes to the store, brings it back. Brings back toothpaste too. He’s a lavatory retriever. (I got this joke from Steve Feldman; the crowbar joke too.)
I don’t mind that there are few new movies. There are plenty of old movies that I have not seen, and old TV shows too.
I like that people are leaving New York and LA. It’s healthy, and saves on rent. Folks still travel there, mostly for the rioting, but lockdowns are nicer in Michigan.
More people are hunting, and hiking, and canoeing. These are active activities that you can do on lockdown. The old activities were passive, or going out to eat. Passive activities are almost a contradiction in terms.
We’re cooking more at home, which is healthier. And squirrel doesn’t taste half bad. If I live through this, I’ll be healthy.
I’m reading more, and have joined goodreads.com. I’ve developed a superpower: I find can melt ice cubes, just by looking at them. It takes a while but they melt.
A lot more folks have dogs. And folks have gotten into religion. Wouldn’t it be great, if after death we fond that dyslexic folks were right. There really is a dog.
There was an election last week. My uncles voted for Biden, which really surprised me. They were staunch Republicans when they were alive. My aunt got the ballot and convinced them. She was a Democrat when she was alive.
I got pneumonia vaccine shot, and a flu shot. That wasn’t a joke. I think it’s a good idea. Here’s why. People mostly die from pneumonia not the virus.
Before COVID, the other big crisis was global warming. Al Gore and Greta Thunberg claimed we had to shutter production and stop driving to save the planet. COVID-19 has done it. The next crisis is over-population. COVID is already curing that problem — not so much in China, but in the US, Europe, and South America.
Just As a final thought, let’s look at the bright side of the virus. If we don’t, the next crisis will be worse. Take Monty Python’s advice and Always look at the bright side of life.
Robert Buxbaum, November 20, 2020.