The Public Realm and the Public Good

This is a pair of Supertrees.  They're in Singapore, at a place called Supertree Grove, which is part of the Gardens by the Bay; and they've made me think about one of the ways we do public space in the UK.  But I need to set things up a bit first.

I'd not expected to like Singapore; or, more strongly, I'd expected not to like it.  It's got a reputation for being a bit preppy, a bit too hyper-capitalist, a bit authoritarian, a bit... well, a bit neat.  But I went there for a conference in 2010, and I loved it.  I got a sense that the reputation was accurate to an extent, but only to an extent.  For sure, it's authoritarian, and it does a good show of being very ordered.  But it's also completely bonkers.  Not that I can put my finger on exactly why, of course.  But it is.  If you've been, you'll know what I mean.  If you don't... you should go.  (Forced to elaborate, I'd say something about the juxtaposition of the hyper-modern and sleek with the rather more ramshackle; about the way that finance capital rubs shoulders with food hawker stalls; about the way that Taoist temples in Chinatown and Hindu shrines in Little India are only a few minutes walk from gleaming skyscrapers.  Bonkers, for sure - but also beautiful.)

Anyway: I got the chance to go back there at the beginning of this month, on a work thing.  I made a show of reluctance, but I did want to go back.  And while there, I wanted to go to see Supertree Grove, which wasn't there last time.  These "trees" are a bit hard to describe.  They're big.  They're a funny shape.  They look like something from the cover of a sci-fi paperback.  Part of their function is to be a component of exhaust and aircon system for the biomes.  But they're obviously much more than that; another part of their function is aesthetic.  They're home to thousands of plants, and are artworks in their own right.  They fit perfectly into the bonkers-but-beautiful theme.

As it goes dark, they're illuminated; and twice an evening, there's a 15-minute son et lumière show.  It's cheesy as hell, but there's no shame in giving in to that every now and again.  And this is the bit that made me think about public space in the UK and in Singapore.  Though you have to pay to go into the biomes, the rest of Gardens by the Bay is free - including the son et lumière.  Not only that; there's no branding.  Were it in the UK, I'm pretty sure that there'd be signs all over the place trumpeting that the show was brought to you in conjunction with SuperBank MegaCorp, and there'd be an announcement to that effect as well (as if SuperBank MegaCorp had any relevance at all to the lives of the people watching).  And in hyper-capitalist Singapore?  Nothing like that.  It's just there.  A good thing, provided pro bono publico - which may be what makes the cheesiness of it OK.

A Limited Defence of Toby Young

(Originally posted as a two-parter at the other place, here and here.  Admittedly, events have moved on a bit since yesterday, but the point about eugenics stands.)

The response to Toby Young's appointment to the new Office for Students has covered the whole range from "He's not the best person for the job" to "He's the worst person for the job".  Some of the reasons offered have to do with unsavoury comments about women; some have to do with his general lack of qualification.  Writing in The Times, Janice Turner is - I think - balanced in her assessment of his qualities, but still finds him to be (to say the least) wanting.  But the thing that's of interest to me here, on what is a bioethics-related blog, is one of the other sources of controversy: his public support for (a kind of) eugenics.  The mere fact that he could be associated with eugenics has had some people in paroxysms.  Taken more or less at random here's a tweet from Vince Cable:

Theresa May stood by Toby Young when she should be firing him. This is a man who has a record of misogyny and backs eugenics. His appointment shows poor judgement and, as May admitted, a lack of due diligence. It seems all you need to survive is be a friend of Boris Johnson #Marr

— Vince Cable (@vincecable) January 7, 2018

Note that "backs eugenics" is offered as being a reason in itself to object to Young's appointment.  Cable is not, by a long way, the only person to make this sort of comment.

Is it justified, though?  Well, the article that's generated the ire is this one, called "The Fall of the Meritocracy", published in 2015 in Quadrant.  It's a long piece, and the eugenics bit only comes about 80% of the way through, and for that reason I'll only home in on a few details.  But it is worth looking in a bit more depth at some of those details.  I think that what he's arguing is, in many ways, fairly unremarkable.  It's mistaken in important ways, too; I'll come to those in the next post.  But whatever problems there are with the piece do not flow from the use of the "E-word".  And so, to the greatest extent possible, I'll try to talk about it without mentioning eugenics.

New Scientist is Not Amused

(Cross-posted from the other place)

You might remember the couple of days a few years ago in which the overlyhonestmethods hashtag went viral on Twitter: for those of you who don’t, it was a little joke in which academics – mainly, I think, natural scientists – made not-entirely-serious “confessions” about how they do their work and the corners they might sometimes be tempted to cut.  (Everyone knows that those of us in the humanities don’t really have methods, natch.)  Then someone wrote a blog post, since taken down, on plos blogs that complained that the hashtag was dangerous because of the damage that it might do to science in the public mind.  Similar concerns were aired elsewhere; this is an example, though much less po-faced than the former.  And it was the former that sprang to mind when I read Jessica Hamzelou’s editorial piece in last week’s New Scientist.

Her target is the seasonal edition of the BMJ and its traditionally lighter tone.  Part of her complaint is that some of the jokes aren’t… well, aren’t all that funny.  She notes the paper about man-flu, which got a fair amount of media traction, as an example, asserting that “[i]f this is meant to be a joke, it’s not a very good one”.  Now: maybe papers like this are basically fluff; and maybe that even as jeux d’esprit, they sometimes don’t hit all the high comic notes.  But so it goes: I don’t think that there’s all that much to worry about here, and I’m not going to get into a discussion about humour, beyond pointing out that there’s a difference between papers that are meant to be taken lightly and those that are meant to be funny, and that I suspect the BMJ selections tend towards the former category.  But there’s another side to her complaint:

[N]ot everyone is in on the joke – and in an era of fake news, maybe it is time for a rethink. The BMJ tells journalists reporting its papers, including these daft ones, to “please remember to credit the BMJ – this assures your audience it is from a reputable source”. And indeed, this silly science often receives straight-faced coverage from influential media outlets. What’s more, once it is archived in scientific databases, these papers get cited like any other. They are even used as the basis for future studies. After all, why wouldn’t you take the BMJ seriously? […]
And how might it be read in the future? Months or years down the line, devoid of the context of Christmas, who is to say this paper won’t be cited seriously? Could it influence the study of flu?

Well: yeah, but no.  One of the points I keep making to my students is that they shouldn’t treat rhetorical questions as if they are, or are capable of doing the work of, arguments.  After all, there’s a danger someone might answer them, and not in the way they expected.  And with that in mind…

Persian and Provincialism

It's been a while since I posted a Persian update here; it was difficult to keep much momentum when the basic alteration from one week to the next was "Learned a bit, forgot a bit, didn't make much progress".  I didn't complete any of my summer exam because I looked at the page and simply couldn't read a word of it.  It took me a while to un-freeze my brain; and by that time, the semester was over and there were no lessons.

My erstwhile teacher has said I should come along to the next level of lessons all the same; but I don't think I'd be up to it - and, anyway, they don't fit easily with my other commitments.  I may resit the beginners' course in semester 2.

In the meantime, and in addition, I've found another Persian teacher, with whom I'm having one-to-one lessons via skype.  Slowly, slowly, I'm making up ground.  But... well, you know there's going to be a but.

It turns out that what I'd been learning at the University last year was very, very formal and rather outdated; were I to turn up in Tehran and speak to people, it'd be somewhat as if Jane Austen were to materialise here.  OK: I'd be understood, but people'd be puzzled, and I might not understand them too well.  What I'm learning now is much more colloquial.  Pronunciation is slightly different, with syllables dropped or contracted into each other; some of the long alephs become vavs, too: thus, for example, "they", آنها (anhā), becomes اونا (unā).  I've also learned that a lot of people really struggle with dipthongs including the vav - many younger Iranians wish it'd just go away.  Thus "sister", خواهر (^khahar), is sometimes contracted to خاهر, on the basis that the و doesn't do anything.  If you're sending a text, those spare characters can be important!  Granted, this kind of shift isn't the sort of thing about which I have to worry a great deal, but the point stands that classroom Persian and everyday Persian sometimes come apart.

(Incidentally, I struggle to pronounce خواهر, however you want to spell it.  It's something like ^khahar; but there's something about the differentiation of the "^kh" sound of the خ, and the "h" of the ه that I struggle to make, and I keep pronouncing the first "a" more like "ar", too.  I don't know why I have a mental block about it - but, on the other hand, I don't have a sister either, so it may not matter much all things considered.)

On a slightly deeper level, most verbs in the simple present are indicated by the prefix mi-.  Hence "To come", آومدن (amadan), becomes man mi'am, to mi'ai, u mi'ad for I/ you/ he or she come(s); "To eat", خوردن (hourdan) becomes man mi'houram, to mi'houri, u mi'houreh.  But some aren't: for example, "To have", داشتن (dāshtan) becomes man daram, to dari, u dareh - except when it doesn't; hence one could say "man mi'daram" for "I have", and people'd think you're from Shiraz, because Shirazis do use the mi- prefix.  (Note that the ending of the third person singular is something else that shifts is colloquial Persian; I'd initially learned that verb endings were basically -m, -i, -d, -im, -id, nd; but they're often, albeit not always, -m, -i, -eh, -im, -id, -n in real life.)

"Top of the Lake" may Sink as a Procedural, but Look Beneath the Surface

A couple of weeks ago, BioNews invited me to review Top of the Lake; this is the version I submitted there, free - for better or worse - of editorial cuts.

There's a moment in the final episode of this second series of Jane Campion's Top of the Lake where Nicole Kidman's character Julia reminds Elizabeth Moss's character Robin, a policewoman and our protagonist, that she, Julia, is the 'real mother' of Mary (Alice Englert), the troubled and endangered young woman at the centre of the drama. Mary is adopted: Julia raised her, whereas Robin merely gestated her. An argument about exactly what it means to be a mother is not only important in the relationship between Robin and Julia: it is key to the main plot of the drama.

A body has been found washed up on a Sydney beach, and is discovered to be that of a Thai woman working in one of Sydney's legal brothels. The dead woman was pregnant when she died, but the baby is not genetically related to her; episode 2 ends with Robin's realisation that the dead woman was acting as a surrogate. What follows is a story that weaves together the rather murky worlds of the legalised sex trade and commercial surrogacy, which is illegal under New South Wales law.

Hands up if you shouldn't be working this case!

Now, it’s worth interjecting at this stage with the observation that, if there’s one thing we learn from Top of the Lake, it’s that Australian police have some very sloppy procedures and conflict-of-interest regulations. Gwendoline Christie plays Miranda, with whom Robin is partnered in the investigation; Miranda is not only having an affair with her boss, but is also trying to have a baby by surrogacy with him. Worried that the foetus taken from the dead woman might be her own, Miranda has a bit of a barney at the office of the clinic that she patronised (matronised?). This strikes me as the sort of thing that might see a real police officer removed from a case, at the very least; but nothing at all is mentioned about it. Police officers having affairs with each other? I’m sure that happens. Police officers engaging surrogacy services? Likewise. Police officers investigating a case that straddles the boundary between legal and illegal surrogacy, at the behest of a commanding officer with whom they are trying to start a family by means of a legally-iffy surrogacy service? Is there no oversight here? At the same time, via Puss, the none-more-sleazy pimp played by David Dencik who has something to do with the illegal surrogacy racket and with whom Mary is besotted, the story is also very personal for Robin – just as was the story in the first series of Top of the Lake. Again: should she really be working on this case?

Maybe there is method in writer/ director Jane Campion’s plotting. There is a good point to be made about how our attempts to separate the private/ personal and the public/ political can only ever be partial, and that it’s often in women’s lives that we see the intersection most clearly. But there’s also a risk here of Robin becoming a slightly rough-at-the-edges Miss Marple: someone around whom Bad Things keep happening, and with whom you probably wouldn’t want to spend too long in a country house. Whether a third series of TotL would be possible without characters becoming mere ciphers for political points is unclear.

Admittedly, it’s a bit early to worry about the plausibility of a programme that might not ever be made; and the implausibilities of this series (or what one hopes, for the sake of effective policing in Australia, are implausibilities) ought not to detain us too long. For there are deep and troubling questions that the series raises.

Brexit, Fraud, and Law - update

A little over a year ago, I posted something about someone who had set up a crowdfunder campaign to bring a prosecution over Brexit.  I was not impressed.  I concluded by saying that the person behind it, one Marcus Ball, "should think very carefully about whether to keep his campaign going".  Of course, I'm not pompous enough to think that my opinion on this stuff counts for much, or that it'd make any contribution, or that Ball would even have read the post.  But if everyone with a blog allowed that to stop them, there'd be nothing on the internet.

I thought I'd have a look at what he's up to now.  There's still a website, but the clearest updates seem to be on the crowdfunder page.   Ball reached his initial target, so one might wonder what progress he'd made in his case.  The answer would seem to be... er... not a heck of a lot.  It appears that he contacted some lawyers, who told him in January that he didn't have a case, and he then went back to them in February with a 25 000-word document and had persuaded them that he did after all by March.  He is, though, unclear about what the legal objections were, and about how he overcame them.  One wonders why, if he is that much more competent than the lawyers he's hired at the expense of 6 000 donors, he needed them in the first place; but that's for another day.  Since then, he's written for his lawyers another pair of documents; one is 22 000 words long, and the other 10 000 words.  They must love him.  He's now asking for more money (some of which will fund a salary for him).  Hilariously, after the latest update on the BrexitJustice crowdunder, he adds a note:

Charlie Gard: An Ethical Analysis of a Legal non-Problem

(This is an extended version of a post that originally appeared at EJIL: Talk!)

For those with an internet connection and an interest in current affairs, the story of Charlie Gard been hard to avoid recently. A decent précis is available here; but it’s worth rehearsing.

Shortly after his birth, Charlie’s health began to deteriorate, and he was diagnosed with a terminal and incurable mitochondrial DNA depletion syndrome. By March 2017, Charlie needed artificial ventilation, and doctors at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital (GOSH) applied to the High Court for confirmation that removing that ventilation would be lawful, having judged that it was not in his best interests. This was contested by his parents, Chris Gard and Connie Yates; the High Court ruled in favour of GOSH. This was confirmed by the Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights. During all this time, Charlie remained ventilated.

In the High Court, Mr Justice Francis said that his decision was subject to revision should new evidence emerge favouring continued treatment; in July, Charlie’s parents returned to the High Court, claiming that Charlie might benefit from an experimental treatment being offered by Professor Michio Hirano of Columbia University. However, as proceedings advanced, it became clear that Hirano’s proposed treatment had never been used on patients like Charlie, that he had neither seen Charlie nor read his notes when he offered the treatment, and that he had a financial interest in that treatment. The position statement issued by GOSH on the 24th July barely hides the hospital’s legal team’s exasperation. On the 24th July, Charlie’s parents dropped their request for continued treatment. The details of Charlie’s palliative care were still disputed; his parents wanted it to be provided at home, with ventilation maintained for a few days. The High Court ruled against this on the 27th July. Charlie was moved to a hospice; his ventilator was removed, and he died on the 28th July, a few days before his first birthday.

The way this case has played out has not been pretty. Elements of the American media (this piece is one among many) and the political right wing used it to launch attacks on single-payer healthcare systems:

Our hearts weep for #CharlieGard Our prayers are w/ him. Pls read & ask WHY govt should have power to decide who lives & dies. It's wrong. https://t.co/MsvoJBqJyO

— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) July 24, 2017

Nigel Farage weighed in, complaining about the state taking away parental rights:

UK medical establishment closed ranks on #CharlieGard's parents & the state took away their rights. Change required. What a total disgrace. pic.twitter.com/TRBWWYTwJb

— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) July 24, 2017

From the left, Giles Fraser wrote that the case was being dealt with too rationally. None of these claims is justified, and many left-leaning people have been surprised to find themselves in agreement with Melanie Phillips on this matter.

Legally, the case was very straightforward.