56. Another Heavy Rain

I was sleeping so heavily. I guess it took a while for it to register on my consciousness that it is storming outside, and it is a full thunder- boomer. Only Sammy was there hiding and waiting for me on the patio, coming inside with his usual plaintive whine. I hope that Coco and Ash were not waiting for me but gave up and ran elsewhere. Mostly I just hope they make it in. Another heavy rain. I don’t think they forecasted even a slight chance for this possibility. This is better than the old drought at least. It’s just the old saw: you can get too much of a good thing.

Hitch

Hitchens has some words on Sir Isaac Newton.

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We are inclined to forget that the word “scientist” itself was not in common use until 1834. Before that time, the rather finer title of “natural philosopher” was the regnant one. Isaac Newton may have been a crank and a recluse and a religious bigot and (during his period as a master of the Royal Mint) an enthusiast for the hanging of forgers. However, the study of ancient thinkers and antique languages was second nature to him, and when he listed the seven colors of the spectrum - having carefully separated these from their formerly all-enveloping white light - he did so by an analogy with the seven notes of the musical scale. Any other conclusion, he felt, would violate the Pythagorean principle of harmony. He was probably wrong in this glimpse of the unified field theory that was to elude even Einstein, but one has to admire someone who could dare to be wrong in such a beautiful way.

-- Christopher Hitchens, “Isaac Newton: Flaws of Gravity” in Arguably

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Cultural Diversity and Economic Inequality

George Packer has raised some discussion over the arguably surprising correlation that greater social equality seems to have come with greater economic inequality. Samuel Goldman has made a couple of interesting points that I want to keep. First, he argues that it is not a mere accident that these two things should work so well together.

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In our time, the stories of greater social equality and economic inequality are far from “unrelated”. Rather, social inclusion has been used to legitimize economic inequality by means of familiar arguments about meritocracy. According to this view, it’s fine that the road from Harvard Yard to Wall Street is paved with gold, so long a few representatives of every religion, color, and sexual permutation manage to complete the journey. Superficial diversity at the top thus provides an moral alibi for the gap between the one percent and the rest.

-- Samuel Goldman

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Mr. Goldman then argues that it is also harder to achieve greater economic equality when you have a racially diverse and highly pluralistic society.

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More generally, it is hard for a society characterized by ethnic and cultural pluralism to generate the solidarity required for the redistribution of wealth. People are willing, on the whole, to pay high taxes and forgo luxuries to support those they see as like themselves. They are often unwilling to do so for those who look, sound, or act very differently. In this respect, the affirmations of choice and diversity that now characterize American culture, tend to undermine appeals to collective action or shared responsibility. If we’re all equal in our right to live own lives, why should we do much to help each other?

-- Samuel Goldman

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Daily Fun

PostSecret

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