Women Advance? Some Evidence

It's interesting to follow the posts on the FSA Facebook Group for a number of reasons.

Sometimes posters in the group ask for help on various issues, questions of policy, software, approaches to handling service during the pandemic. Sometimes it's just sharing news, funny stories, etc.

In the last week there was a work issue which seems to have been solved by some software developed by a county employee, which a number of people asked for.  Back in the day that sort of thing happened as well.  A couple difference from 30-40 years ago:

•  the existence of the Facebook group.  I don't think we had a formal sharing site before the SCOAP QandA's in the late 80's and Jeff Kerby's BBS around 1990 or so. There's more lateral communication these days as opposed to running things up and down the ladder of the hierarchy.
• the gender of the person creating the solution. In the old days the creators tended to be males (I'm thinking of doing programs for programmable calculators around 1980 and queries for the System/36.  I might be wrong on this--it might be I just noticed or remember the men more and/or the female creators were operating in a more informal environment.

I think both differences are good. 

A Bad Tuesday Evening- Unexpected Violence?

Some are worried by the possibility of  violence resulting from the 2020 election.  Their fears seem mostly to be that Trump supporters will be upset by a Biden victory and commit some violence.  The fear is of "sore losers" I suppose it's possible that some on the right have a similar "sore loser" fear of violence coming from Biden supporters if Trump pulls off another upset. 

As a general proposition I'm not that afraid of the scenario. But there is one which I just thought of which scares me.

I remember occasions, I think mostly when a college wins either the NCAA football or basketball championship where the students take to the streets and riot, destroying property, etc.  We normally dismiss such episodes, at least I dismiss them, as "boys will be boys".

But, there's a lot of emotion invested in the outcome of this election. Isn't it more likely that election violence will come from "exultant winners"?  I remember the election of 2008, when the winners exulted.  That was a victory of love, of belief in Obama, of the redemption of America, and I don't remember any particular violence, or animosity directed towards McCain supporters.

But a Biden victory on Tuesday would be a victory based on a lot of animosity towards Trump, and some of his supporters. 

I always like a metaphor, so think of the exultant winners and despondent losers as two masses of plutonium, back in the days of the Manhatten Project.  Keep them separate and everything is copasetic.  Bring them together and you get a nuclear explosion.

The Future of Vertical Farming

 This asks the question: Can Vertical Farming Grow Beyond Herbs and Leaves?

I'm dubious, if we're talking generally.  I can see vertical farming might work in niche areas: on the moon and Mars or in permanently inhabited space stations, where it's the only economical alternative.  Or in areas such as Iceland, where geothermal power means cheap cheap electricity, which current powers aluminum smelters and datacenters for block-chain systems. Or in the grand future when we have practical fusion.  

Or there may be a technological breakthrough which drastically changes the economics.  But bottom line, I don't see its broad comparative advantage, particularly as long as we use fossil fuel to generate electricity and, if as I assume, it's a net contributor to carbon dioxide emissions.

The Most Christian Continent?

 From this source via the Templeton foundation, it's Africa.  The trick here is that the ranking is based on total numbers, so Africa with 631 million has more Christians than Latin America with only 601 million, but in percentage terms Latin America at 92 percent blows away the other continents.

Where is North America, you ask? At 277 million it's the smallest of the big five continents.

Will Justice Barrett Disappoint the Right?

 She's almost guaranteed to.  Only Justices Alito and Thomas have not, in recent memory at least, disappointed the right on some decision or other.  Kavanaugh is too early to be a fair case, but I'd predict he also will. (For one thing, he's the father of daughters, which research has shown sometimes leads to more liberal conclusions.)

What are some things which might lead her to surprise conservatives on some cases?

• She's a mother, unlike everyone else on the Court.
• She's the mother of two black children.
• She's a woman, and her two fellow justices who are women are also liberal.
• She's young as justices go, so she has plenty of time to evolve.

She's also likely to change the group dynamics of the court--a 6-3 split may lead one of the majority to distinguish her/himself from the others.

Nepotism

 Matt Yglesias at Vox writes on nepotism.  It's a thorough and to my mind bipartisan treatment.

I do wish Biden had been asked during the debate what role, if any, his family would play in his administration. Would he have replied: the same sort of roles as my predecessor has assigned to Ivanka, Don Jr., Eric, Jared Kushner or would he have excluded them? Would he promise to put his assets into a blind trust? 

The Golden Rule Applies in Government

 I've referred before to the idea of a "golden rule", the cynic's version: those that have the gold gets. It's also known as the "Mathew Effect", named by the sociologist Robert Merton from verses in the New Testament.

Saw another instance of it, from Hawaii where ProPublica reports that the "Homestead Program" (who knew we had a century-old program to provide homesteads to native Hawaiians) this:

But no one, not even the Department of Hawaiian Home Lands, the state agency that oversees the initiative, fully understood how far the program has strayed from its original intent. A first-of-its-kind analysis by the Honolulu Star-Advertiser and ProPublica of department data showed the program has benefited those with the means and knowledge to navigate the complex homesteading system while leaving behind much of the Native Hawaiian community it was primarily meant to help.

I suggest there are similar instances throughout government where the legislature passes a worthy program, but enrollment is required and there's an information gap, so some of those who might qualify simply don't know about it or don't know enough to navigate the hoops. 

Network Effects in the Classroom

 Washington Post magazine had an interesting article by a university English teacher on teaching English, including through the transition in the spring to Zoom.
What struck me was this: 

"Especially in a class organized around discussion, it’s the level of the floor, not the ceiling, that most dictates the strength of the group. Even if you get lucky and have two or three great English students in a class, they can’t carry a weak group, and it’s more likely that the gap between the standouts and the rest will breed resentment....

My insistence that all students participate in class discussions isn’t just some kind of touchy-feely inclusiveness, nor is my insistence that they bring the reading in hard copy and shut off all electronic devices some kind of aggressive old-fashionedness. Rather, it’s a recognition that the class works better for everyone if we’re not dragging along silent or distracted partners, and of what’s special and valuable about what we’re doing. Students are essentially paying for two things in a humanities class: the admissions process that produces the students in the room, and the hiring and promotion process that produces the teacher. Everything else they can get at home, online: They can do the reading, study scholarship about the writers and their eras, post opinions and even watch lectures about literature (most of which are bad, so far, but if you dig you can find substantive ones, and in time there will be more).

What happens in the classroom — humans paying attention to books and one another — may seem rudimentary to a fault, but it’s a vanishingly rare and precious experience. Most of the people in the room will never again gather regularly with other people to think deeply about something they have all read, uninterrupted for 75 whole minutes by text messages, emails, buzzes, beeps, dings, klaxons, flashing lights, tempting links, breaking news alerts or GIFs of naked mole rats dancing..."

One way of thinking about this is the idea of "network effects"; the idea that the more participants on a network you have, the more attractive the network is.  So in a classroom, consider the activity, the speech in the classroom during the duration of the class to be a network, where the more participation you have the more value for all.

I don't know that the observation leads anywhere, but I like it.  

Farm Program Payments

From  here, a nice graph of US farm payments, including MFP and CFAP.

 

Today's Tractors

It's amazing how far out of touch I can get.  Was discussing this morning the likely cost of a modern tractor.  I guessed 6 figures.  My first search turned up this ad for a used John Deere, a 2016 model. Asking price is $300K+.  Further searching showed a lot more progress in guidance and precision than I expected.  Also checked wikipedia and their entries seem somewhat out-of-date.